The Hindu 10.06.2013
Smart phones for sanitary supervisors
On the heels of putting in place a mechanism to improve hygiene in public toilets, the Coimbatore Corporation is planning to arm sanitary supervisors with smart phones to ensure that the toilets are clean and user-friendly.
According to sources in the civic body, officials are planning to distribute smart phones with apps that will help the supervisors check if the toilets are user friendly.
The app, when launched, will ask the supervisors for answers in ‘yes’ or ‘no’ format to a set of questions.
The questions will relate to water supply, cleanliness, power supply, etc. to which they will have to reply once or twice every day after inspecting the toilets of which they have been put in charge. The application will send the details to a server at the Corporation.
The server will read all the ‘no’ answers and generate a report for officials to set things right.
The sources say that in all probability the Corporation may go in for smart phones with android. It has given the broad contours of its requirements to an agency to come out with a solution. The Corporation manages 285 free toilets across the city.
Prior to answering the questions, the supervisors should have visited the toilets. To ensure that they do so and not send answers to the questions without visiting the toilets, the app will have hidden features.
At present, the Corporation has assigned each sanitary supervisor one or two toilets for inspection once or twice a day. In April this year, Corporation Commissioner G. Latha tasked all sanitary supervisors with ensuring that the toilets are clean.
The sanitary supervisors were asked to report the condition of toilets on a daily basis to zonal sanitary officers, who, in turn, should report to the city health officer.
Smart phones will have apps to help supervisors check if toilets are clean and user-friendly
