Chandigarh, July 22 (IANS) About 1,000 students are participating in a sanitation week here in which they will be taught about keeping their environment clean and leading a healthy lifestyle, an official said Tuesday. To observe the ‘International Year of Sanitation-2008′ declared by United Nations, a Chandigarh-based NGO Yuvsatta along with the Government model high school, Sector-26 was conducting a ’sanitation week’ in the school campus from July 21-26.

“Children are often eager to learn and willing to absorb new ideas. Here teachers can act as role models and better hygiene behaviour learned at school can lead to life-long positive habits,” said Khuswinder Sharma, district education officer while inaugurating the workshop.

Around 1,000 students of the school are expected to participate in various contests on the theme of sanitation to be organized in this week-long workshop.

“In the last few days over 100 cases of diarrhoea and cholera have been identified in Chandigarh and its adjoining towns of Panchkula and Mohali. Majority of them are children so it is necessary to educate them about better sanitary and healthy lifestyle,” Parmod Sharma, Yuvsatta coordinator, told IANS.

Each year, diarrhoea kills over half a million people in India and is presently posing a major problem in Chandigarh region, said Purnima Vats, school principal.

She added that she will encourage her teachers to reinforce good sanitary habits through practical demonstrations, repetition of messages during prayer sessions and sport events.