KASARAGOD: A district wise mass cleanliness drive covering major roads, as a part of the ‘Arogya Jagratha Programme’ was started in Kasaragod district on May 9. The district wide campaign covered 76.8 km of the National Highway, 29 km of the Kerala State Transport Project (KSTP) road, 33 km of the State Highway and 91 km of major roads in the district.
To promote the campaign Dr Sajith Babu, district collector and his deputies joined the volunteers in the campaign to promote cleanliness.
Student Police Cadets, National Service Scheme Volunteers, Kudumbashree workers, representatives of local residents’ associations, workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, Haritha Karma Sena volunteers and members of other voluntary organisations also joined the drive.
The garbage collected during the drive was temporarily transferred to government plots near the Plantation Corporation of Kerala at Cheemeni, Regional Agricultural Research Centre at Pilikode and Kerala Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (Kinfra) at Seethangoli.
To further support the drive, the collector said that special squads are going to be constituted to take action against those dumping waste in public places.
Dr Babu said that special squads would be constituted to act against those dumping waste in public places. The squads would include police personnel, officials of the Revenue Department, panchayats and municipalities. In forest areas, forest personnel would also be included in the squads, he added.
According to officials, in the next phase of the cleanliness drive that is on May 11, ponds, streams, drains and other water systems in the district would be cleaned.