Swachh Bharat Mission

About SBM

To accelerate the efforts to achieve universal sanitation coverage and to put focus on sanitation, the Prime Minister of India launched the Swachh Bharat Mission on 2nd October, 2014. The Mission Coordinator for SBM is Secretary, Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation (MDWS) with two Sub-Missions, the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) and the Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban). Together, they aim to achieve Swachh Bharat by 2019, as a fitting tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on his 150th Birth Anniversary.

In Rural India, this would mean improving the levels of cleanliness through Solid and Liquid Waste Management activities and making villages Open Defecation Free (ODF), clean and sanitised.

Vision

The aim of Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) is to achieve a clean and Open Defecation Free (ODF) India by 2nd October, 2019

Objectives

• To bring about an improvement in the general quality of life in the rural areas, by promoting cleanliness, hygiene and eliminating open defecation.
• To accelerate sanitation coverage in rural areas to achieve the vision of Swachh Bharat by 2nd October 2019.
• To motivate communities to adopt sustainable sanitation practices and facilities through awareness creation and health education.
• To encourage cost effective and appropriate technologies for ecologically safe and sustainable sanitation.
• To develop, wherever required, community managed sanitation systems focusing on scientific Solid & Liquid Waste Management systems for overall cleanliness in the rural areas.
• To create significant positive impact on gender and promote social inclusion by improving sanitation especially in marginalized communities

Strategy

The focus of the Strategy is to move towards a ‘Swachh Bharat’ by providing flexibility to State governments, as sanitation is a State subject, to decide on their implementation policy, use of funds and mechanisms, taking into account State specific requirements. The Government of India’s role is essentially to complement the efforts of the State governments through the focused programme being given the status of a Mission, recognizing its dire need for the country.

The key elements of the Strategy include

• Augmenting the institutional capacity of districts for undertaking intensive behaviour change activities at the grassroots level
• Strengthening the capacities of implementing agencies to roll out the programme in a time-bound manner and to measure collective outcomes
• Incentivizing the performance of State-level institutions to implement behavioural change activities in communities.