Answering nature’s call in unknown places will cease to be a nightmare. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is planning to launch a mobile application, which will provide information about public toilets in the city.
According to civic officials, the lack of toilets in the city makes it difficult for people to locate them. In addition to this, there are no boards indicating the presence of existing toilets. Due to this people, especially working women, face lot of difficulties. A huge floating population of women daily visit the city for shopping, sightseeing etc.
“The solid waste management (SWM) department has prepared the mobile app, which will provide information about the location, distance and direction of public toilets. It will also have pictures of the toilets and their condition, so that people can decide on their usability,” said deputy municipal commissioner Vijay Balamwar (SWM).
We have taken help from IT experts and web designers to make the app, which is ready to be launched. Information procured from the on-government organisations, which have been maintaining the toilets, have been included in the app, he added.
According to civic officials, there are 1,035 public toilets in city, in which 8,305 seats are for men and 5,136 for women. They belong to various agencies like the BMC, state government and the Centre. Mumbai needs as many as 1.15 lakh toilets to become an open defecation free city. As 117 open-air defecation spots still exist all over the city, the BMC faces a stiff challenge to achieve its target of making the city free from open defecation.
Women’s group in the city have been demanding more toilets, especially for working women, who visit Mumbai daily from far away places. Taking this into account, the civic body has decided to construct more toilets for women in the city. Civic chief Ajoy Mehta has said the civic body will construct more public toilets for women in the city. He has also issued directives that a special inspection of contractors, who had taken up the task of building public toilets for women but have failed to deliver, be carried out.
