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Niti Aayog report: ‘Kumbh-2019 a great management lesson in ensuring cleanliness’
Kumbh Mela-2019 was a great management lesson in ensuring cleanliness, feels a Niti Aayog team.
Kumbh Mela-2019 was a great management lesson in ensuring cleanliness, feels a Niti Aayog team.
The team, which visited Prayagraj in April to document the various aspects that went into ensuring the success of the event, billed as the biggest global religious gathering at one place, noted that nearly 1.2 lakh toilets were constructed/installed to avoid open defecation and urination across the 3,200 hectare mela area.
Nearly 5,000 religious and social organisations had put up their camps in the mela area.
“Apart from 1.2 lakh toilets, another 62,500 community toilets were built in public spaces such as bus stops, parking lots and the roads. Nearly 20,000 urinals and 40,000 institutional toilets were also placed inside akhadas and the tent city,” said the Niti Aayog report accessed by HT.
“Besides, more than 20,000 safai karmis were engaged for street sweeping and cleaning of the toilets and urinals. Other infrastructures were also created to ensure end-to-end on-site and off-site sanitation, including laying of permanent sewers of about 8.5 km length in Parade area to receive toilet waste from the mela area,” the report noted.
Over 1500 swachhagrahis or paid volunteers under the Swachh Bharat Mission were employed to motivate and assist people to use toilets to make the mela area open defecation and litter free. Apart from this, over 1,000 Ganga praharis and Ganga Task Force volunteers were engaged as foot soldiers, the report said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had felicitated sanitation workers by washing their feet in Prayagraj during the mela.
“The success of the mela can be largely attributed to the strong political will, effective coordination of the various central and state agencies and the motivation of the stakeholders to serve. The various programmes of the government of India like AMRUT, Swachh Bharat mission, smart cities mission etc have also been helpful in providing a structured infrastructural base in Prayagraj,” the team noted.
The Niti Aayog team also noted how technology was used for intelligent traffic management, disaster management, using artificial intelligence management tools for crowd management in a scientific way.
The Niti Aayog report also noted how Intelligent Traffic Management System was used at various traffic junctions.
“An in-depth security plan was put in place with three tiers of security, 40 police stations, 3 female police stations and 58 police outposts, besides deploying more than 20,000 police personnel, 20 companies of PAC and 54 companies of CAPF commando teams. Forty firefighting centres, 15 fire outposts and 40 watch towers were erected. Special focus was given on river safety by providing deep water barricades and deploying rescue motor boats,” the report noted.
Fully digitized 15 ‘lost and found’ centres were set up across the city and mela area, supplemented by public address system, the Niti Aayog report said.
The mela was successful in boosting economic activity, tourism and employment besides projecting our national image, the team noted and added that it also effectively demonstrated organizational skills of the Adityanath government.
