AMRUT: Integrated Orientation Training Programme for Municipal Functionaries of Odisha

Venue: Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi
Date: 12-14th February, 2018

CSE Water Team organised a three day Integrated Orientation Training Programme for Municipal Functionaries, belonging to 4 cities of Odisha– Bhubaneswar, Rourkela, Sambalpur and Anugul.

On first day, Dr. Mahreen Matto, Programme Manager of Water Unit, CSE welcomed the participants and gave an overview about CSE’s work at national and global platform. She also talked about the development issues caused due to increasing urbanisation and discussed the strategies to be opted in order to promote sustainable urban growth through organised planning, development and governance. Further Dr Matto discussed in detail about the Amrut programme - the thrust areas under Amrut, Reforms, Service Level Benchmarks (SLB), Service Level Improvement Plan (SLIP), State Annual Action Plan (SAAP), Funding Pattern, Capacity Building etc. Later, Mr. Mritunjay Kumar, Programme Officer, CSE briefed participants about the different missions/schemes of Ministry of Housing and Urban affairs (MoHUA) and their convergence. During second half of the day, Mr. Bhitush Luthra, Deputy Programme Manager, CSE discussed about sanitation scenario of India and how each city can improve its sanitation condition by having a city sanitation plan followed by mapping its excreta through Shit flow diagram (SFD) and doing Faecal Sludge and septage management (FSSM) as around 60% of India is dependent on Onsite sanitation. This was followed by the group exercise on septage collection method and designing sludge drying bed by Mr. Bhavik Gupta.

On second day, Ms. Pallavi Sen of Technical Support Unit, National Urban Livelihoods Mission (NULM), took session on NULM mission guiding principles, various schemes and reform majors for generation of self employment through training placement. Later the training focused on understanding the decentralized approach of wastewater treatment including reuse, where Ms. Chhavi Sharda, Programme Officer of Water Unit, CSE also gave case studies from various parts of India to get insight of the best management practices. The last session of the day talked about solid waste management where Ms. Swati Sambyal, Programme Manager of Waste Management team, CSE discussed about the waste management challenges and presented one of successful case study on Muzaffarpur, Bihar how through involving various stakeholders helped in implementation of waste management practices.

On third day, Ms Shivali Jainer, Programme Officer, CSE took session on understanding the importance of green spaces in flood mitigation and ground water recharge. The implementation strategies of Sustainable Urban Drainage system (SuDS) was supported by documentary on ‘Design That Hold Water’. Furthermore, the participants were toured around the CSE campus to showcase decentralised wastewater treatment system (DWWTs) and rainwater harvesting at institutional scale. The last session of the training programme was focused on air pollution and transportation, where, Ms. Priyanka Chandola, Programme Manager of Air Pollution team, CSE, discussed about the sustainable mode of transport in urban cities. She emphasized on the use of non-motorized transport like public transport, cycles, and also talked about the implementation of stringent policies to strengthen the initiative. She also talked about air quality - PM 2.5 and PM 10 and how it is affecting the health of citizens and what measure are being taken to resolve the issue.

At the end of day, Dr. Suresh Rohilla, Programme Director, CSE moderated the feedback session, where participants expressed their perception about the quality and key learnings from the training programme. They showed confidence in doing the things differently rather than working on conventional way. They also mentioned that through the training they have got a more holistic picture of how all the sectors like water, sewerage, solid waste, etc are interconnected. Thereafter certificate was distributed among the participants.