Coimbatore’s report card for Swachh Bharat mission is so far so good. Coimbatore ranks 18 at the all India level. It ranked 156 in the previous assessment. This is thanks to the several corporate houses, NGOs, social activists and the Swachh Bharat ambassadors who have actively participated in the various activities to make this initiative successful in the city.

In an effort to spread the message of hygiene and cleanliness as part of the Swachh Bharat initiative, city based The Arc Foundation organised their ‘Raise your hands for hygiene’ campaign in Chamraj Higher Secondary School in Udhagamandalam recently.

“The level of knowledge on personal health and hygiene is very limited across India. Poor hygiene and health practices restrict the socio-economic, psychological and health wellbeing of children, adolescents, especially girls,” says Aparna M.A., one of the founders of The Arc Foundation.

Raise your hands is a part of SHAPE (School Health Awareness Absenteeism Prevention Empowerment) initiative, which focuses on health and hygiene in school. This one day programme was organised in two sessions at the school premises.

As part of the agenda, this programme was divided into two sessions. The first one was targeted towards the primary school children in which 250 students participated. The second session was aimed at high school students and as attended by 550.

Both started off with an ice-breaking session and this was followed by the volunteers demonstrating to the students the hand washing steps. The students also practised the hand washing steps with the hygiene action song being played in the background. There were six hand washing counters that were installed at the location. Each of the counters was supervised by two instructors and two National Cadet Corps (NCC) cadets who guided the students on the various hand washing techniques.

A white cloth banner was hung between the pillars of the auditorium. This allowed the students to hand print on the cloth as a mark of this initiative. A poster that had a pictorial representation of the 13 hand washing steps was also released. The students were taught the lyrics of the ‘washy washy’ fun song that allowed them to sing along while washing their hands.

The Arc Foundation has plans of taking the campaign to other schools in and around the city.