Panaji, May 29 (IANS): Maintaining cleanliness should be a part of culture and people should work towards making Goa the cleanest state in India, Governor Mridula Sinha said on Wednesday on the eve of Goa Statehood Day.

"We have to continuously renew and accelerate our efforts to keep our state clean of garbage and filth. This is a matter of culture. We should collectively work to achieve this objective and attain the status of being the cleanest state in India," Sinha said in her message.

Sinha, one of the Swachh Bharat Mission ambassadors appointed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said that cleanliness had always been a part of "our moral system and we must retain it for the generations to come".

Commenting on the inclusion of Goa as a state in the Indian Union on May 30, 1987, Sinha said that achieving statehood was a long and much-cherished dream of the people of Goa.

"Statehood gave the people of Goa a distinct identity and individuality, besides providing them ample opportunities to shape the destiny of their land," Sinha said.