Administrative Head's Column

GANDHIJIS IDEA ON VILLAGE SANITATION

In a national level meeting on Swachchha Bharat Abhijan at New Delhi in the early part of 2016, a Union Minister said, “We have taken up clean India Campaign only now, but Ramakrishna Mission has kept their attention focused on cleanliness for the last 100 years. If you visit a centre of Ramakrishna Mission, you will not only find everything clean there, but the spiritual ambience there cleanses our mind also.”This gives an idea about how we are looked up to by the society.
There is a proverb
‘'Cleanliness is next to Godlines.‟Mahatma Gandhi used to give much attention on cleanliness. If villages become clean, the mind of villagers also will be clean and villagers also will be free from different types of diseases which occur due to lack of hygiene. According to him, every rural development worker should first take initiative to clean villages as entry point activity before starting any work and he himself take leadership in sweeping with jharu to motivate others. Cleanliness is one of the important parameters of a developed village.Government of India is also giving much emphasis on this issue through implementation of different flagship programmes like The Clean India Mission, Namami Gange etc.
All of us can easily understand the importance of this cleanliness and its relevance at present day context. This great problem can easily be solved if all of us join our hands remembering the oft quoted passage, if the load of person is shared by many, it becomes simply a stick to all.’ If all of us become sweeper, there is no need of paid sweeper and cleanliness become natural as told by a citizen of Singapore to our former president A P J Abdul Kalam answering to a question: How the cities of Singapore remain clean all the time?
So, it is the moral duty of all us to maintain this cleanliness for the good of all. Let all of us try to practise this in our University, residence, working and public place to make our motherland clean, green and healthy.

Illustration: Atanu Deb