The BBMP will conduct drives in the upcoming weeks to raise awareness about the new initiative called Loo Review.
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has made efforts to Geo-tag its public toilets. Now, citizens of Bengaluru can locate public toilets by just typing ‘toilet’ in Google Maps. This will help them find the nearest public toilet. An official at BBMP says, “The process of geo-tagging toilets will not only help people to find the nearest place but will also help in eradicating open defecation in the city.” It is nice that after Swachh Bharat Mission, lots of public toilets are being built and with the Google search it will be easy to figure out and use the nearest toilets”, said by Shruti, a shop owner at M.G.Road.
According to Government of India, The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, under the Swachh Bharat Mission, has partnered with Google to launch the Loo Review campaign to encourage all local guides in India to locate public toilets on Google maps. This campaign allows all citizens to not only locate public toilets in their cities on Google maps but also provide feedback on the same. As per the official reports, 500+ cities in India with more than 30,000 toilets with the name of “SBM Toilet” are currently live on Google Maps.
One of the main objectives of the Swachh Bharat Mission- Urban is to provide sanitation coverage through public toilet facilities across cities in India for achieving Open Defecation Free (ODF) status. Daakshay, a resident of Attigupe said, “I was not even aware that there is a provision of searching BBMP public toilets on Google Maps. It is a great initiative; however, more awareness should be spread by authorities.”
“We are planning to spread more awareness about the Geo-tag-Toilets in the city. We will most probably start with it in the upcoming week”, informed by an official in the solid waste department, BBMP.
