Most of us have heard the famous quote by Indian author Shiv Khera: “Winners don’t do different things, they do things differently.” This was conclusively proven in a nationwide exercise, which was recently started in India. Yes, the cleanliness drive by the Indian government called Swachh Bharat, which means Clean India.

The Prime Minister Narendra Modi has invited nine popular personalities from different fields, to initiate the drive to clean India. Just like the ‘Ice bucket challenge’ became popular across the globe, Modi urged these nine celebrities to invite nine other people of their choice to take up this cause of cleanliness.

Cleanliness is not an alien concept to the people of India. Right from the pre-independence days, legends like Mahatma Gandhi, Acharya Vinobha Bhave and subsequent several governments have encouraged people to promote cleanliness. Unfortunately, all those efforts proved not so fruitful.

For the first time, in a public function, the Prime Minister emphasised to the people that the government alone cannot do anything in this regard. It requires a wholehearted participation from all citizens of the country.

He did not hesitate to repeatedly spell out his priority of cleanliness at various forums including the most responsive crowd of 20,000 at Madison Square, US. This awareness is the pre-requisite for this extremely difficult initiative to succeed. Although, the government has done nothing new, rather doing the same thing but in a different way.

Who does not like to see a clean India? Which Indian does not want visitors to India and for them to carry good impressions about India? Everyone does. But then, intentions are of no value unless they are translated into actions.

Today, we are seeing big names like industrialist Anil Ambani, cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and tennis player Sania Mirza united for a common cause, and that was only possible to achieve because of the innovative method introduced by Modi. It induces these stars to not only contribute but to propagate it further till it reaches the grassroots.

- The reader is an Indian resident based in Dubai.