Bengaluru: For men who avoided public toilets for want of currency coins, here’s good news. To curb urination in public places, the BBMP is planning to make all its public toilets across the city free to use.
The civic body, which has also drawn up big plans to revamp hundreds of public toilets across the city, has battled with public toilet maintenance issues for many years. It has called for tenders to provide free use facility in its 537 public and community toilets.
BBMP Administrator T.M. Vijay Bhaskar said that the aim is to stop open urination, which has become a public nuisance. “There is no sense of shame among men who urinate in public places. Often the excuse is that they don’t have small change to pay for the public toilet. They take the easy way out and urinate on the walls of a public toilet. To put an end to all this, we will provide free use facility in public and community toilets,” he said. However, those visiting the toilet for defecation will have to pay and use.
The BBMP has also set up 260 inspection teams to check the conditions of public toilets and the report is expected to reach the administrator soon. Mr Bhaskar, said, “As of now, the teams have identified over 250 new places where the public toilets are needed.
Apart from these, they have also identified toilets which are no longer in use, those which need repair and those which are not needed. Acting on the report, we will take action.” The BBMP has earmarked Rs 50 crore for repair and maintenance of toilets and will use Nagarottana funds for the project.
The BBMP will also lend toilets to corporate firms which are willing to maintain under their corporate social responsibility initiative.
“We have received a positive response from MNCs and they are willing to maintain public toilets. We are in the process of identifying toilets which can be given for private maintenance,” he said.
