Unhygienic, Unusable! This MCC Public Toilet for Men & Women Raise a Stink, & You’ll Puke
Mangaluru: Definitely as the saying goes, ”When you got to go, You got to go!”- It means you have to go to the toilet really bad when you can’t control your bladder. And that was my case this morning, even though my bladder was full- and I needed to pee bad, and as I was on my way to Padil via Maroli road, I saw a Mangaluru City Corporation public toilet near the entrance of a road that leads to White Doves and Little Sisters Home for the Aged- and I was happy that this toilet came to my rescue.
Oh, no-I was wrong. Thought to myself that a City which boasts about being one of the Smart Cities of India is not able to maintain and keep a public toilet clean. First I tried to enter the Men’s toilet, but it was terrible and unusable, so I decided to check the women’s toilet since no women were around- and that was much worse. Therefore my only option was to step behind the building and relieve myself, simultaneously getting sucked by a swarm of mosquitoes, which have been breeding in all the mess gathered there. What an experience!
No doubt this Unhygienic and Unusable MCC Public toilet needs some quick attention in restoring it to normal before someone else could experience what I faced. Being a busy stretch of road joining the Bengaluru Mangaluru highway, with many vehicles passing by, this toilet needs some attention in cleaning so that travellers, including drivers and riders, could make use of, rather than allow it to sit idle and stink. With the City spending lakhs on e-toilets which are going extinct due to lack of maintenance and carelessness, the MCC toilets also don’t help in serving the purpose.
And one of the women’s toilets is locked and only used by women from nearby shops, which is nothing but women empowerment when this public toilet belongs to every woman who wants to use this facility. And a petty shop near this toilet that sells food and daily needs items, however, selling cigarettes and gutka, the surrounding area has been littered with cigarette butts and gutka wrappers. Not a good example of Swachh Mangaluru! Just like my ride on this stretch in trying to use a public toilet proved to be an unpleasant one, I bet many might have also felt the same situation.
However, most of the public washrooms in the City are either shut or locked from inside. But the sight of this toilet was unbearable. I am not alone in facing this predicament. At a time when the city has secured as one of the Best Smart City in the Swachh Bharat Survey, the progress in terms of sanitisation of public toilets for men and women is not even halfway through in that direction.
In a reality check, if you look around the City several public toilets are in dilapidated or unhygienic condition. The stench from many of these public toilets is so nauseating that one could throw up. Moreover, the door knobs of some of these toilets are defunct or locked. The Public complained about choked seats, broken flush systems, algae on the floor and stinking around the cubicle. There is no proper sink/basin to even wash hands.
Those in authority never being oblivious to their role of rolling out platitudes over the need for hygiene and sanitation. The number of public toilets in the city is few and even those which exist are not being maintained as well as they ought to be. Condition of those located in the bustling market areas, or near bus shelters used by the traders and the shoppers, most of them are simply horrible. It is beyond our comprehension why they remain filthy despite us paying for their use.
Ms Anita Shetty, who was found shopping in the busy Market Road area echoed the same complaint. “The marketplaces in the city are generally bereft of public toilets. We are greatly inconvenienced because of this. We go to the nearby restaurants to use their washrooms for relieving ourselves. There should be at least two public toilets in the market areas. We wonder why the civic body and others are not bothered about the problem we have been facing,” she said. Another local trader said they usually relieve themselves in the open in the absence of public toilets in the old Central market area. “We cannot help doing this as we are left with no other option. The nearest public toilet is near District Wenlock hospital or state bank bus stand which are far from our shops,” he added.
A college student recounted the same problem. “Dearth of public toilets in the main areas of the City is a grim problem. The toilets which exist are seldom cleaned. Swachh Bharat or Clean India Campaign does not merely mean establishing toilets in places where they do not exist. It also means cleaning those which exist regularly. However, I doubt whether things would look up, given the nonchalant character of those who are supposed to look after these things,” she added.
Hope our new MCC Commissioner, MCC Mayor, Health Officials in MCC, and also the authorities in the district administration will follow and take action after reading this report in restoring the dirty public toilets, including the one featured in this report here, to its originality, like they were when the officials had inaugurated by cutting the ribbon?
Photo Album – Click Here
ALSO READ RELATED ARTICLES:
-
Used Condoms Lying Behind the Stinking/Dirty Men’s Toilet at DC Office Campus Paint a Sorry Picture
-
Website Impact! Used Condoms Disappeared-Men’s Toilet Looks Clean
