Skip to main content

Toilet construction: Modi government fails to achieve target, "indulges" in data manipulation

Construction of household toilets (Nos)
By Our Representative
Is Prime Minister Narendrda Modi's Swacch Bharat campaign, launched on August 15, 2015, beginning to flounder? A recent analysis of the official figures of the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation says, the target for household toilets was set at 98 million more toilets by 2019, which would require constructing 46 toilets per minute. However, in 2014-15, just 11 toilets were constructed per minute.
According to the analysis, titled "Will India get freedom from open defecation?", by Sushmita Sengupta in the "Down to Earth" journal's Independence Day special, "This means that construction has to speed up by four times the present rate. At the pace of 2014-15, the target would be achieved by 2032, and not 2019." As against an average of 67,000 toilets per day needed to achieve the target, the actual construction was just 5,933 per day in 2014-15.
As part of his campaign, the Modi government also set another target -- to have at least one toilet in every school by 2015, an "easier" task as there is no need to spread awareness among the users.Here also, there is a huge gap. The total number of schools where functional toilets have to be made is 418,000, while so far only 257,000 have them, which means that 161,000 do not have functional toilets, suggesting only 61 per cent of the target has been achieved, the analysis claims.
The journal believes that there is some manipulation in the data as well. Following official meetings in June and July, the Union ministry for human resources on school toilets, for instance, came out with clarification that "about 317,000 toilets had already been constructed till July 27, 2015."
Says the analysis, this contradicts the official figures already published. "The Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE) data of 2013-14, that gives a complete database of schools in the country, says that there is a need for 419,000 toilets in the school. Hence, there is still a short fall of over 100,000 toilets." Despite this, the Swachh Vidyalaya website on August 11 said "97.16 per cent of the target has been achieved" and only "11,882 toilets will be constructed in four days."
Construction of school toilets (Nos)
This suggests, the analysis says, that the "the data projected on Swachh Vidyalaya website, the numbers of completed toilets being built daily seems to be skyrocketing unrealistically." It underlined, "While on August 11, twelve states were listed in list of pending projects, the number went down to four the next day".
Further, the analysis suggests that the latest data available from government sources show 22,838 toilets were constructed in seven months between August 2014 and March 2015, which is "in contrast with the numbers revealed by Swachh Vidyalalya website that says the government could construct 89,000 in 15 days between July 27 and August 11, 2015."
Analyst Sengupta comments, "The Modi government seems to be ignoring the fact that statistical interpretation of some data are making their desperation to achieve the target very clear. The rates at which the government has worked for this mission are more than 50 times of any initial drive. The data sheet for few UTs are totally absent from the website."
She adds, "Moreover, if we see the performance of schemes since 1986, when the first national sanitation programme was launched, it is seen that numbers never actually matter. It is poor maintenance, improper designs without water connection and lack of awareness that made the existing toilets also dysfunctional."

Comments

TRENDING

Right-arm fast bowler who helped West Indies shape arguably greatest Test team in cricket history

By Harsh Thakor*  Malcolm Marshall redefined what it meant to be a right-arm fast bowler, challenging the traditional laws of biomechanics with his unique skill. As we remember his 25th death anniversary on November 4th, we reflect on the legacy he left behind after his untimely death from colon cancer. For a significant part of his career, Marshall was considered one of the fastest and most formidable bowlers in the world, helping to shape the West Indies into arguably the greatest Test team in cricket history.

Andhra team joins Gandhians to protest against 'bulldozer action' in Varanasi

By Rosamma Thomas*  November 1 marked the 52nd day of the 100-day relay fast at the satyagraha site of Rajghat in Varanasi, seeking the restoration of the 12 acres of land to the Sarva Seva Sangh, the Gandhian organization that was evicted from the banks of the river. Twelve buildings were demolished as the site was abruptly taken over by the government after “bulldozer” action in August 2023, even as the matter was pending in court.  

Tributes paid to pioneer of Naxalism in Punjab, who 'dodged' police for 60 yrs

By Harsh Thakor*  Jagjit Singh Sohal, known as Comrade Sharma, a pioneer of Naxalism in Punjab, passed away on October 20 at the age of 96. Committed to the Naxalite cause and a prominent Maoist leader, Sohal, who succeeded Charu Majumdar, played hide and seek with the police for almost six decades. He was cremated in Patiala.

United organisations oppose privatisation of health services in Madhya Pradesh

By Our Representative  In a strong show of opposition, multiple health associations under the umbrella of the United Organisations for Action against Privatisation of Health Services have condemned the Government of Madhya Pradesh’s recent moves towards privatising public health facilities. They argue that these actions, including outsourcing and the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model, will compromise the availability and accessibility of essential health services for the state’s citizens.

Outreach programme in medical education: Band-aids for compound fractures

By Amitav Banerjee, MD*  Recently, the National Medical Commission (NMC) of India, introduced two curricular changes in medical education, both at the undergraduate and the postgraduate levels, ostensibly to offer opportunities for quality medical education and to improve health care accessibility among the underserved rural and urban population.

Swami Vivekananda's views on caste and sexuality were 'painfully' regressive

By Bhaskar Sur* Swami Vivekananda now belongs more to the modern Hindu mythology than reality. It makes a daunting job to discover the real human being who knew unemployment, humiliation of losing a teaching job for 'incompetence', longed in vain for the bliss of a happy conjugal life only to suffer the consequent frustration.

A Hindu alternative to Valentine's Day? 'Shiv-Parvati was first love marriage in Universe'

By Rajiv Shah  The other day, I was searching on Google a quote on Maha Shivratri which I wanted to send to someone, a confirmed Shiv Bhakt, quite close to me -- with an underlying message to act positively instead of being negative. On top of the search, I chanced upon an article in, imagine!, a Nashik Corporation site which offered me something very unusual. 

Will Left victory in Sri Lanka deliver economic sovereignty plan, go beyond 'tired' IMF agenda?

By Atul Chandra, Vijay Prashad*  On September 22, 2024, the Sri Lankan election authority announced that Anura Kumara Dissanayake of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP)-led National People’s Power (NPP) alliance won the presidential election. Dissanayake, who has been the leader of the left-wing JVP since 2014, defeated 37 other candidates, including the incumbent president Ranil Wickremesinghe of the United National Party (UNP) and his closest challenger Sajith Premadasa of the Samagi Jana Balawegaya. 

Will Bangladesh go Egypt way, where military ruler is in power for a decade?

By Vijay Prashad*  The day after former Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina left Dhaka, I was on the phone with a friend who had spent some time on the streets that day. He told me about the atmosphere in Dhaka, how people with little previous political experience had joined in the large protests alongside the students—who seemed to be leading the agitation. I asked him about the political infrastructure of the students and about their political orientation. He said that the protests seemed well-organized and that the students had escalated their demands from an end to certain quotas for government jobs to an end to the government of Sheikh Hasina. Even hours before she left the country, it did not seem that this would be the outcome.