Global social service organisation, the Sulabh International, today firmed up strategic tie-up with the Punjab government for a statewide hygiene programme. The Sulabh will join up the state government initially for the construction of public and private hygiene units, including improvised, low flush toilets for the rural and the urban poor in three districts, focusing on the Kandi areas of Hoshiarpur, the waterlogged areas of Muktsar and the border belt of Tarn Taran districts. These however would be pilot projects for ultimately bringing the entire state within the ambit of the project.

The two parties signed a memorandum of understanding when the founder of the international social service body Padam Vibhushan Dr Bindeshwar Pathak called on Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal here this morning. All 12,500 villages and several urban areas of the state are proposed to be covered under the project.

The India-based organisation SISSO works to promote human rights, environmental sanitation, use of non-conventional sources of energy, waste management and social reforms through education. Initially, the organisation will execute the construction of of 519 units of Sulabh Shauchalya (flush toilets) in four villages Panjwa (105 units), Sikhwala (192 units), Tarmala (93 units) and Gaggar (129 units) at total cost of Rs 51.90 lakh. Each unit will cost Rs 10,000.

The Chief Minister expressed concern to provide Sulabh toilets in the poorest of the poor areas in rural and urban Punjab. He invited Dr Pathak to visit the interior Punjab to have first hand information about the sanitation problems and suggest ways and means to tackle these effectively. The Chief Minister was highly impressed by the presentation made by Dr Pathak to highlight the activities and achievement of SISSO.

Badal assured Dr Pathak of state government's support in his mission to provide sanitation to people of Punjab especially in the rural areas through the concept of 'Sulabh Shauchalaya'.