Civil Service Bytes

SWACHH BHARAT MISSION Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) on October 2, 2014, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. The ambitious programme aims to make the streets, roads and infrastructure across the country clean by October 02, 2019, the 150 th  birth anniversary of the Father of the Nation. It is India’s biggest ever cleanliness drive. The relevance of the Swachh Bharat Mission Sanitation has emerged as a key issue since the 2011 Census highlighted e glaring data on lack of toilets in the country by stating that over 26 million people in India defecate in the open. Launched with an estimated cost of around Rs 62,009 crore, Swachh Bharat Mission aims to achieve the elimination of open defecation in the country. Among its other objectives are conversion of insanitary toilets to pour flush toilets, putting an end to the inhuman practice of manual scavenging and carrying out Municipal Solid Waste Management (MSWM). Involvem...

The term ‘Smart city’ conjures up visions of self-driving cars, touch-sensitive interfaces, and adaptive energy systems. What drives this vision is the possibility that ‘Big Data’ and the integration of ‘Information and Communication Technologies’ (ICTs) could transform urban governance, making urban infrastructure more responsive and effective in meeting the needs of citizens. The catch, however, is that your city can only be as smart as the data it has access to. The idea of Smart cities rests upon the notion of live and continuous data collection, but this only works if every single citizen is registered on the database. The problem in most developing country cities, or cities of the ‘Global South’, is incompleteness of data, and the poor quality of existing datasets. The National Census is the most complete household level dataset available in India, but this is collected every ten years, and given the rapid urban growth we are witnessing (17% between 2001 and 2011 according to ...

Children would be encouraged to visit soldiers on the borders to develop a better understanding and convey the nation’s gratitude for their services by ‘Seema Darshan’ programme for students for a period of five days starting from 22nd January 2016. What is ‘Seema Darshan’ programme? ‘Seema Darshan’ is a unique initiative in which school children are visiting the border areas of our country and present before our soldiers and troops an array of performances showcasing the tradition and culture of our country through traditional songs and dances. Who is organizing the programme? The Ministry of Human Resource Development in collaboration with the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Home affairs. Objective: To provide the students with a first-hand experience of the prevailing security environment in the border areas. To foster patriotism and nationalism among the students. To provide an opportunity for the children to experience the border environment. To...