Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has launched a mission called 'Sanitation of Schools' (SoS), which is an initiative to work with companies on construction of toilets across the schools in the country. CII's mission is an effort to strengthen the 'Swachh Bharat' initiative announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"As India's apex industry body with a direct membership of over 7200 from the public as well as private sector and an indirect membership of 1,00,000 enterprises, CII will work with industry and the Government to make Swachh Bharat a reality," said President Designate of CII Sumit Mazumder
. "We have set up a mechanism to create awareness and encourage industry participation through our network of 64 offices in India, spread across 26 states and 2 Union Territories."
According to recent United Nations statistics, half of India's population does not have access to toilets, the condition is even more dismal in the rural areas where around 60 percent of the population still defecates in the open. Poor and inadequate sanitation accounts for various health-related issues causing economic and social losses.
It is estimated that 1.01 lakh Government schools do not have toilets for girls, 1.52 lakh schools do not have toilets for boys and a 1.64 lakh schools have dysfunctional toilets. Poor sanitation facilities lead to drop out from schools, especially among girls between the ages 5-14. Retention of the girl child in schools has increased by 30 percent in schools with access to proper sanitation facilities.
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Therefore, adequate and appropriate sanitation facilities are a pre-requisite for the socio-economic development of the country.
CII will leverage its Membership across India to make 'Swachh Bharat' a reality. The initiative will be led by the CII Foundation which was set up in 2011 to undertake a wide range of developmental and charitable activities and initiatives pan India by enabling industry.
The CII Foundation will work closely with a specially constituted task force for this initiative which will be lead led by past president of CII and Executive Vice Chairman of Hinduja Group R Seshasayee and Past President of CII and Former Chairman of Murugappa Group MV Subbiah.
The Task Force will work at the National, Regional and State level to promote and facilitate industry participation towards sanitation in Government schools.
