'Swachh Bharat' has caught India's imagination: Jaitley

Union Minister for Corporate Affairs Arun Jaitley on Tuesday claimed that the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan has caught the imagination of the entire country.

"If there is one programme or call that has caught on the imagination of the entire country, which has transgressed beyond the government and accepted by the people of India as their programme, it is the Swachh Bharat campaign The reasons are very obvious: the value of cleanliness were always highlighted in the multifaceted discourses of Mahatma Gandhi, but somewhere down the track took a back seat, and the consequences are very obvious," Jaitley said, while speaking at the launch of the Swachh Bharat programme adopted by Jubilant FoodWorks Limited, which has the franchisee for Domino's Pizza and Dunkin' Donuts.

"Swachh Bharat is not merely an aesthetic concept, it is a preventive healthcare programme. The per capita expenditure on diseases caused by dirt is huge and its consequences on human health and life are enormous. It is for this reason that the Prime Minister chose the Independence Day to give a call for the Swachh Bharat campaign," he added.

The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan aims at making India a clean country by 2019, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.