The Government has chalked out a programme to make all the Two Lakh 60 thousand Gram Panchayats in the country free from open defecation in the next ten years. This was stated by the Minister of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Mr Jairam Ramesh while replying to questions in the Rajya Sabha today. He said out of the total Gram Panchyats, only 28,000 have been declared as Nirmal Gram Panchayats. The Minister said there is a huge gap between the data provided by the Census on sanitation and the data given by the state government agencies.

He said the government depends more on the information provided by Census. Mr Ramesh said the Union Budget for 2012-13 has made adequate allocations for safe drinking water. Replying to the main question, the Minister said the Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC) is being implemented in 607 rural districts of the country.