GANGTOK: Not in too many Indian villages would residents welcome you to click a photo of their toilets and then pose for a photoshoot with the lavatory in the background. In Sikkim ’s Basilakha , a village of 120 families in its east district, residents happily escort you to show their toilets, with some of them bragging about the upgrade to European commodes.Basilakha is not an exception. In every village of Sikkim, a former monarchy annexed to India in 1975, people have a sense of pride that their state is India’s first and only open defecation-free state, a record reiterated early this month by a nation-wide sanitation survey undertaken by a Central government agency, the National Sample Survey Office."Our family has had sanitary latrine for many years now. But cleanliness here is not because of our toilets alone. No one here uses plastics, no one smokes in public places, no one urinates in the open, and no one litters. There is a penalty for every violation," says Ganga Subba, a resident of Basilakha and cultivator of cardamom, vegetables and flowers, which she sells in the weekly bazaar of Gangtok, the capital city located about 30 km from her village. Gangtok and, for that matter, every town and village in Sikkim, could make a perfect case study for the Swachh Bharat Mission — except that the state began its cleanliness drive more than a decade before Swachh Bharat was even a gleam in the Modi government’s eye.The model has evolved over the years to ensure citizens abide by the rules — breaking them fetches stiff fines. Urinating in a public place, for example, could cost a resident or a visitor Rs 500; the penalty for smoking in public places is Rs 200. These provisions of penalty — all part of a legislation passed by the assembly — have been enforced for over a decade now."When I see the Swachh Bharat campaign in such a big way across the country, I feel vindicated. Yes, I did something right way back in 2003," says CM Pawan Chamling. The campaign for a clean Sikkim began 13 years ago, with the first acknowledgement of its success coming in 2008 when the Government of India bestowed the state with the Nirmal Rajya award, a national honour for cleanliness.In Sikkim’s main cities such as Gangtok or Namchi (the latest addition to the Central government’s list of smart cities), there has been a conscious effort to install public filters for drinking water, build more public toilets and introduce a better signage system — some of the parameters often deployed to rank a city’s cleanliness.However, Gangtok mayor Shakti Singh Chowdhary, a Haryanvi born and brought up in Sikkim, is not happy with the city receiving only the eighth rank in an all-India clean city ranking survey — Swachh Sarvekshan 2016 — released early this year. He explained how the city authority has been working hard on parameters such as segregation of waste before disposal, and introduction of a better signage system for public toilets. He believes that relative poor performances in those parameters pulled Gangtok down to the eighth rank, behind cities such as Mysuru, Visakhapatnam, Surat and Rajkot.Plastic, banned in Sikkim for over a decade now, is rarely spotted. But the city is confronted with a bigger devil — PET (polyethylene terephthalate) water bottles, which are discarded by tourists. In government functions, those bottles have already been banned and if, the state machinery has its way, there could soon be a complete ban on such water bottles, forcing tourists to use only RO or filter water available in designated public places, hotels and restaurants.The state may go ahead with such a radical move as there is a political consensus on a PET ban. Congress state unit president Bharat Basnett says his party would welcome a state government ban on PET water bottles which, once executed, would be yet another first in India. Basnett adds: “Sikkim has been clean from the days of monarchy. Cleanliness is in our culture. Let’s give full credit to its disciplined people, and not the government.” While Sikkim has clearly emerged as the cleanest, with a possibility of becoming the first state with zero poverty (only 8% families are now living below poverty line), the challenge is to maintain the momentum. “Sikkim has a history of good civic behaviour. Yet, it will be quite challenging to sustain its cleanliness drive and also its ODF (open defecation free) status,” says Akshay Rout, an officer on special duty in the Union ministry of drinking water and sanitation and one of the nodal officers in the Central government’s Swachh Bharat mission. Rout adds that Kerala and Gujarat are the two other states that have been moving fast towards becoming 100% open defecation free.For Sikkim, a bigger challenge has however come in the form of the 14th Finance Commission, which has changed the earlier formula of Central funding, which in 2015-16 was 20% lower than a year ago. This, at a time when funds to all other states have seen a 35% aggregate increase after the implementation of the 14th Finance Commission recommendations. If the average increase of Central funds to all other states had been applied, Sikkim should have received `3,313 crore in 2015-16, and not `1,974 crore, according to a November 8, 2015, letter of CM Chamling addressed to Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, a copy of which was reviewed by ET Magazine. Chamling’s Sikkim Democratic Front is an ally of BJPheaded NDA at the Centre. An anguished CM says that although the reduced flow of funds from the Centre won’t impact Sikkim’s cleanliness drive, it will impact maintenance of the state’s infrastructure, mainly roads.For citizens of Sikkim, though, the theme song may well be “Don’t Worry, Be Happy”. As Sikkim’s lone Lok Sabha MP Prem Das Rai says: “Because of clean living, people in Sikkim are healthy and happy. I can claim Sikkim is one of the happiest states in India.”Mahatma Gandhi, on whose birth anniversary two years ago the Swachh Bharat Mission was launched, had said: “It does not require money to live neat, clean and dignified.” Chamling will doubtless take pride in Sikkim’s neat, clean and dignified citizens, but he would also be quick to point out that their swachhata is hardly a reason to tighten the money flow to the state.The mayor of Gangtok, Shakti Singh Chowdhary, is a Haryanvi Jat originally from Hisar. Chowdhary was brought up in Sikkim, as his father Kor Singh made it a base for his trading business with Tibet. A mechanical engineer by profession, Chowdhary was drawn into politics in 2010 when Gangtok Municipal Corporation was formed; he was elected as a councillor before getting elevated as its deputy mayor and then mayor last year. As this writer walked along with Chowdhary on Gangtok’s MG Marg, he says: "India has so many MG Margs. But this is the cleanest MG Marg in India."Chowdhary says a ban on plastic is complete in Sikkim. But PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottles have become a source of litter. "We have installed filters for drinking water. The government is likely to ban the use of such water bottles in entire Sikkim," he says.Though Gangtok has clearly emerged as a leader in cleanliness in the country, it is still ranked eighth in an all-India clean city ranking carried out on the parameters of availability of individual household toilets, community toilets, and collection, transportation and processing of solid waste, among others. "We lost marks as we did not have proper signage for public toilets. We have now improved on this," says Chowdhary.Edited excerpts from an interview with Prem Das Rai, Lok Sabha MP, SikkimOur CM says Sikkim has clean food, clean air and clean water. We are a fully organic state. Clean food comes from there. There is clean air because we don’t have any polluting industry. The water is clean because it’s glacial-fed. So, there is clean living. And when there is clean living, we are not surprised that the National Sample Survey Office has described us as the cleanest state. Because there is clean living, people are healthy and happy. I can claim Sikkim is one of the happiest states in India.The Government of India’s industrial policy has enabled us to set up some pharmaceutical units. We encourage knowledge-driven and IT-driven industries. Boston Consulting Group has been preparing a report for us on how to leverage the opportunities and position ourselves in 2025.During the Vajpayee government, there was an agreement under which India decided to back off a little on the Tibet side, and China ensured that it would recognise Sikkim as an integral part of India. That quid pro quo finally helped open up Nathu La for border trade (2006). It’s border trade and, therefore, it’s very small. Tibetan and Chinese authorities wanted to open it up much more but the Government of India is a little reticent.ET Magazine visits Basilakha village in East Sikkim to assess the ground reality on cleanliness, use of toilets, cultivation of organic food and the levels of happiness(In pic: The road leading to Basilakha is in poor condition without any metal topping. Villagers complain about the condition of this 5-km stretch which acts as a lifeline to reach National Highway 10 leading to the capital city of Gangtok.)(In pic: Nan Bahadur Subba and wife Ganga Subba in their field. They grow vegetables, flowers and fruits and sell those in the weekly Sunday bazaar in Gangtok, located 30 km away.)(In pic: Hajuraman, 79, cultivates cardamom in his 2-acre land, producing about 300 kg annually. His annual income from cardamom is about Rs 3.75 lakh)(In pic: Children of a village primary school say they not only use dustbins kept in each classroom but also influence their parents to stay clean and healthy)(In pic: When it comes to preparing a dish, homemaker Cathrine Subba prefers traditional Sikkimese meals with organic ingredients)