Garbage issue, cleanliness key highlights in first trip to city

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday chose Bangalore, a city facing a crisis in dealing with garbage, to announce that he would literally wield the broom and clean the streets of the country of filth and garbage from October 2.

At a gathering organised by the Bharatiya Janata Party on his first visit to Karnataka after becoming Prime Minister, Mr. Modi promised to lead the cleanliness drive from the front, making an emotional appeal to “all citizens.”

The Prime Minister asked every citizen to devote 100 hours a year, at the rate of two hours a week, for cleaning public places.

Expressing concern over lack of cleanliness in Union government offices, including the Ministries, he said a cleanliness drive would be taken up in these establishments from September 25, the birth anniversary of Jan Sangh ideologue Pandit Deendayal Upadhayaya, to Gandhi Jayanti.