Centre pushes to make country’s 10 iconic places cleaner

NEW DELHI: The mixed results of the Swachh Bharat movement have not deterred the NDA government from expanding its ambit.

NEW DELHI: The mixed results of the Swachh Bharat movement have not deterred the NDA government from expanding its ambit.

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The country’s national parks will now follow stricter cleanliness guidelines for tourists. The government has also identified Jim Corbett National Park, the biggest reserved forest and top tiger habitat, as the role model for cleanliness.

At a high-level meeting of the environment and forest ministry, Jim Corbett Park’s practice of carrying litter bags in all tourist vehicles, no use of pet bottles and other steps were hailed as the role model. “The park has removed garbage boxes in the forest campus because it found people often throw garbage around the boxes and also such boxes are vandalised by monkeys,” said an official.

Meanwhile, the Centre will push for best cleanliness practices in ten iconic places — seven of them religious places — where tourists come in large numbers. These are Taj Mahal, Manikarnika Ghat, Vaishno Devi, Meenakshi temple, Tirupati, Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, Ajmer Sharif, Golden Temple, Kamakshi Temple and Jagannath Puri. The World Bank will provide technical assistance to keep these places clean.

Parmeswaran Iyer, secretary of drinking water and sanitation ministry, said a two-day workshop will also be organised to chalk out roadmaps specific to each site. The cleanliness programmes will be undertaken under a strict timeframe with financial support from corporate houses.

The government will soon frame a standard operating procedure (SOP) to keep forests clean. Most of the big and popular forests like Kanha, Gir, Tadoba-Andhari, Periyar and Sariska will fall under the new guidelines.