|
More of Chandigarh upgrades to phones, TV, toilets
Chhavi Bhatia
Chandigarh
CHANDIGARH DATA on house, household amenities and assets released on Friday shows a sharp increase of a whopping 88.3 per cent houses in rural areas using telephones as means of communication compared to a dismal 7.9 per cent in 2001.
Residents have also moved to modern means of entertainment like television over a decade, with both urban and rural denizens deserting the humble radio. There is an increase of 8.6 percentage points in the use of television and a corresponding decline of about 25.2 percentage points in radios and transistors as compared to 2001.
The figures were part of the data collected over a decade by the union territory census department, which was released by KK Sharma, advisor, UT here on Friday.
The overall data reflected the rising affluence of the city, with remarkable increase in infrastructure, household assets and amenities over the decade.
The penetration of telephones in daily life in both urban and rural areas in the city could be gauged from the figures that while in 2001, only 34.9 per cent urban houses used a mobile or a landline phone, the concentration rose to 89.3 per cent in 2011.
Rural folk too do not lag behind with 88.3 per cent houses having a telephone facility.
If only 58.7 per cent rural houses owned a television in 2001, 2011 saw around 82.5 per cent switching it on for recreation. Tuning in to a radio, has, however lost favour in the city, which had around 44.1 per cent houses in rural area and 54.4 per cent in urban listening in way back in 2001.
Provision of basic amenities like a toilet have also increased in the past decade with 87.9 per cent houses in rural areas having toilets, a major jump from 47.6 per cent in 2001.
|
The data reflects rising affluence of the city, with remarkable rise in infrastructure |
|
Also, while in 2001, 6.4 houses had pit toilets, the number shot down to a mere 0.1 per cent in 2011. Similarly from 21.1 per cent houses in both rural and urban areas not having toilets, only 12.4 per cent currently are without one. Regarding amenities available with households, 99.5 per cent have tap water, tubewell, handpump and covered well as the main source of drinking water while 93.7 per cent use treated tap water. 86.2 per cent of households have source of water within the premises while 11.7 per cent have to fetch water from a source located within 500 metre in rural area.
fwletters@gmail.com |
