Pay fine for peeing in open, spitting in govt offices

Urinating in open and spitting on government office premises will now attract a penalty as the Centre has issued a new Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) for ‘Swachh Bharat Mission’ to ensure a clean, hygienic and healthy work environment. Littering and non-collection of construction and demolition waste by the contractor will also attract a penalty.

These SOPs have been shared with all Central government ministries, asking them to follow the new procedures to ensure complete sanitation on office premises, senior government officials said.

It mandates every department to form a sanitation committee, under the chairmanship of a Joint Secretary looking after the charge of administration to monitor compliance to the SOP.

The SOP casts an obligation on the authority concerned to “impose penalty on defaulters for littering, spitting and open urinating”, besides conducting surprise inspections at the office premises to ensure a cleanliness.

“If contractors have the obligation to collect construction and demolition waste, it should be done immediately after all work is finished. Failure to do so will attract penalty,” says the SOPs, sent to secretaries of all Central government ministries.

The Central government departments have been asked to carry out self-assessment and ratings for the buildings on the overall sanitation infrastructure by measuring their effort in removing paan and gutkha stains, providing dustbins and required number of urinals to meet the needs.