Swachh Bharat

Maintaining personal hygiene is necessary for many reasons; personal, social, health, psychological or simply as a way of life. Keeping a good standard of hygiene helps to prevent the development and spread of infections, illnesses.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched Swachh Bharat Abhiyan from Valmiki Basti in New Delhi on 2nd October 2014, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. The Prime Minister asked citizens to change their mindsets as cleaning is not only the responsibility of safai karamcharis. The ambitious drive includes sweeping, removal of garbage, debris and unauthorised encroachments from the roads, markets and residential places. The campaign is aimed at making India a clean country by 2019, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

A clean environment ensures the continual existence and survival of all life on Earth. Cleaning the environment reduces pollution, protects unique ecosystems, prevents the extinction of endangered species and conserves resources, such as water, land and air. A clean environment ensures the protection of biodiversity and ecosystems upon which human life and all other life on Earth depends.

If you look around, trash and litter is everywhere. Nobody seems to care about the waste, and how we discard it. If anything, we add to the garbage that is already abundant in the open and is everywhere. Littering a plastic cup on the road-side, after we done using it, is the norm. No one realize anything wrong with it. Throwing our waste on the street, and right outside our own house is a part of the daily routines. That’s how we are, that’s what we think is normal. Having waste and garbage scattered around everywhere does not bother us. We are content within ourselves as long as our house is polished clean up to the front doorstep. When it comes to surroundings, that’s where our responsibilities seem to end. That’s where we tend to stop – our doorsteps.

Taking context of travel & transportation: Throwing waste everywhere makes it difficult for other passengers during the journey and for the next passenger coming in. It takes 2 hours to clean the bus thoroughly from inside and outside after a journey. After a journey bus is filled with empty wafers packets, Biscuits, Bottles etc. this leftovers can be easily carried by the respected passengers but it is generally ignored. Due to this ignorance, Wash room in our bus Club One got choked several times because customers used to litter in the toilet

Sooner or later we have to realize this problem. We need to change our mentality on how we treat our neighborhood and surroundings. Littering is socially accepted in India – nobody minds, no one cares! We can make all the progress, we can make all the economic strides alongside the rich nations, but we can only go so far if we are surrounded by the smelly dirt piles and garbage. Financial and economic breakthroughs are good. However, along the way, what we really need is a change in our mentality to care for our environment, to care for our own surroundings. And, we need to realize this at personal level, sooner than later.