NEW DELHI: In what should come as a wake-up call for the government, construction of household toilets in urban areas in 2015-16 achieved just 54 per cent of the target while the figure was 68 per cent for community and public toilets.
Data submitted by the urban development ministry to Lok Sabha shows that against a target of constructing 25 lakh individual household toilets, only 13.2 lakh were actually built. Work has commenced on 24.6 lakh more such toilets, the ministry said, which is expected to push the pace of completion during this financial year.
Building both individual and community toilet seats are key ingredients to achieve complete sanitation in urban areas, particularly to end open defecation in cities. Gujarat emerged the best performer, accounting for more than one-third of the total household toilets constructed during last year.Eleven states including Assam, Jammu and Kashmir, Meghalaya and Tripura did not report completion of even a single such toilet while Uttar Pradesh improved its position by completing 1.78 lakh toilets.
In the community and public toilet category, all states and Union territories reported construction of only 68,500 toilets against a target of 1lakh. Tamil Nadu, Delhi and MP did better than other states, nine of which, including West Bengal, Kerala and Himachal, reported zero completion. The ministry reported that work had commenced in 1.4 lakh cases.
