India ODF? Toilets considered hotspots of infections, hence people defecate in open

By Aayush Gupta*
"Sanitation is more important than political freedom" -- Mahatma Gandhi
It was on October 2, 2019, that Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the completion of India's Swachh Bharat Mission with the construction of over 107 million toilets – calling India, for once and for all, "Open Defecation Free" (ODF). The announcement came 11 years ahead of the United Nations' 2030 vision.
However, even a year later, experts disagree on the rose-tinted declaration – bolstered further by the Covid-19 pandemic that perpetuates through improper hand hygiene and contact with wastewater. While toilets have been built, it would be a jump to say that the 100% ODF "self-declarations" by India's 603,000 villages, 706 districts and 35 states and union territories are all true.
Success was preordained in the Swachh Bharat Mission – targeting the entire bulk of 602 million residents which defecated in the open. The government, way before 2019, had printed a calendar with the cut-off for October 2019 as the achievement of Total ODF status for India. In one sense, the country did achieve its target, in terms of its definition of ODF itself.
As per the Toolkit for Urban Local Bodies by Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, the definition of ODF pertains mainly to the construction of a toilet and not its use or availability of water. Going a step further, facilities like availability of water and proper drainage are only covered in the broader definition of ODF+ and ODF++ targets under the mission.
It would be unfair to dismiss altogether the achievements of the Indian government – which has made toilets available to over 162 million households across the country. Bollywood has brought the issue to the big screen, with films like “Toilet: Ek Prem Katha” (Toilet: A Love Story) starring famous actors like Akshay Kumar highlighting the issue.
"We need to appreciate that this government has made sanitation a big priority, which has not happened in the past… But this is such a big farce because open defecation by no means has been eliminated," says Nazar Khalid, a research fellow at the Research Institute for Compassionate Economics (RICE), to CNN. There is the elephant in the room, not being discussed.
While the government is proactively sharing details regarding the construction of toilets and implying their use based on self-declarations, valid and comprehensive data regarding their use is lacking. Due to the structure of subsidies and pace of disbursals, thousands of toilets are labelled "under construction" for years now. The awareness of the construction of toilets is nearly not enough.
For example, there is no record of how many single-pit toilets are still being manually scavenged (if at all) at pre-decided intervals. There is a need to create a system to record what happens after a toilet has been constructed.

The definition of open defecation free (ODF) pertains mainly to the construction of a toilet and not its use or availability of water

"Having a toilet does not always mean it is being used…" shares Advik Aggarwal, a past member of Project Raahat – an initiative with the Delhi government to curb open defecation in the capital city. In line with this, there have been reports of toilets being rendered defunct due to lack of use by the community itself. "Successful use of a toilet depends on a number of factors, including proper upkeep and community support.", further mentions Aggarwal.
Lack of social understanding also runs rampant in the Indian mindset. Toilets are considered to be the hotspots of infectious diseases, prompting people to defecate in the open. Apart from avoidance of "stinking urinals", men avoid community toilets for "socialising" with their peers when they go out to defecate in the open.
"The toilet at home has no water. Sometimes, we store water in cans, but it is not enough for the entire family. It's easier in the open where water is readily available.", shares Roshani Bhandari of Malna village with the "Times of India".

Experts further cite unwillingness to pay (for public toilets), improper maintenance and lack of water as the primary reasons for lack of use of toilets. In some cases, defunct toilets are being used to store discarded items. Caste issues also play a major part – since, traditionally, it has been the plight of the lower caste "untouchables" in the Indian society to clean lavatories and sewers.
Three pressing needs emerge out of the entire issue. First, a need for the government to realise that access to toilets does not imply the usage of a toilet – it is a "social distance" we can avoid. Second, reporting of the metrics related to ODF+ and ODF++ metrics need to seep into the mainstream – not only for the urban but also rural regions.
Finally, with access no longer deemed to be an issue, sensitisation needs to take priority – a much broader agenda than the five-year sprint to over 100 million toilets. It is not access, but proper use, which would have made Mahatma Gandhi flushed with pride.
---
*MBA student at IIM Ahmedabad, past member of Project Raahat, a student-run initiative to eradicate open defecation in the urban slums of Delhi, and believes in the power of people to create a better India

Comments

'Halt Covid-19 vaccination drive': Indian doctors join campaign across 36 nations

By Rosamma Thomas* A group of Spanish doctors first got together to call for a halt to the Covid-19 vaccinations, and doctors from other countries too later joined them – there are now over 12,000 doctors from India, Portugal, Canada, Hungary, South Africa, Israel and a host of other nations who have issued a call to halt vaccinations. On September 10, a group of Indian doctors came together to address the press over a webinar to explain why they thought the vaccination drive should end forthwith. Dr Amitav Banerjee, who after a career as an epidemiologist in the Indian Army now teaches at a private medical college in Pune, said there was no longer a medical emergency. Children are at low risk of infection, and there is good reason to halt vaccination and conduct proper research, given the high number of adverse events. There is a sudden and poorly explained spike in the number of young and healthy people dying. While it may be impossible to attribute deaths entirely to the vaccinatio

Did Mother Teresa trivialise poverty? 'You are suffering, that means Jesus is kissing you'

By Harsh Thakor* The world commemorated the 25th death anniversary of Mother Teresa on September 5. Whatever her flaws, she rendered service to humanity in regions almost untranscended, resembling the relentless spirit of the waves of an ocean. Irrespective of community or religion, she offered her service. Even those not drawn by sainthood revere the role of Mother Teresa. For 68 years, she had worked selflessly and tirelessly in India and elsewhere in the world, taught the destitute, healed the sick, fed and clothed the poor, cared for abandoned children, housed lepers and those afflicted with HIV/AIDS and offered dignity in death to desolate persons abandoned by family and society. Mother Teresa was born in Skopje in 1910 to an Albanian family as Anjezë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu. She became wedded to religious vows at an early age and moved to India to join the missionary work of the Catholic Church. Heartshaken by the misery faced by the Indian masses, in 1950 she set up her own

Tracing roots of Hindutva Zionism: cannon fodder for 'warped' nationalist pretensions

By Shamsul Islam* Those who believe in a world free of hegemonic ethno-nationalism, racism, religious bigotry and hatred have rightly taken note of Zionism and its ally Christian Zionism, major perpetrators of ethnic cleansing of ‘Others’. However, the civilized world with its core belief in multi-culturalism and peaceful co-existence is oblivious to a no less dangerous threat to the present human civilization: the Hindutva Zionism. As the term reads it is part of the Hindutva world-view which stands for an exclusive Hindu India minus Muslims and Christians. The other religions like Sikhism, Buddhism, and Jainism will have no independent status but treated as part of Hinduism. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS; National Volunteer Organization) is the most prominent flag-bearer of the Hindutva politics whose cadres presently rule India, the largest democracy in the world. RSS was founded by Keshav Baliram Hedgewar (1889-1940) in 1925 who was disillusioned with the Indian freedom st

Regional parties, anti-Congress progressives, civil society groups 'joining' Bharat Jodo

By Harshavardhan Purandare, Sandeep Pandey* The Congress party declared Bharat Chhodo (Quit India) movement against the British regime in 1942. The Congress party has now launched a movement Bharat Jodo (Connecting and Uniting India) against the Modi regime in 2022. Indian people have had a journey of 80 years since Mahatma Gandhi gave that Quit India call to the British and we have to agree that we stand most divided in our modern history when Rahul Gandhi is giving this Bharat Jodo call to the nation. And back then, Congress was a thriving idealistic political movement against the British rulers and now it is an ever weakening political organization electorally defeated several times. However, it is India at stake, not just the Congress party. That is why so many regional political parties, civil society organizations, traditional anti-Congress progressive forces like socialists and communists, intellectuals and civil servants have declared their support and are proactively partici

Shocking? No Covid vaccine trials conducted on pregnant, lactating women: RTI reply

By Rosamma Thomas* A Right to Information applicant who sought details of safety trials conducted in India on pregnant and lactating women for three Covid vaccines in use in India – Covishield, Covaxin and ZyCov-D -- was shocked to learn from the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) that Serum Institute, manufacturer of Covishield, and Cadila Healthcare, manufacturer of the ZyCov-D vaccine, had not sought permission for such trials. Bharat Biotech, manufacturer of Covaxin, had sought permission for trial on pregnant women and later withdrawn its application. This response , provided after the applicant was initially unsatisfied with the response and went in appeal, is from the joint drugs controller, CDSCO. It was dated September 13, 2022. One researcher closely following the vaccine rollout, however, is of the opinion that the lack of a trial on pregnant and lactating women is a blessing; potential trial participants and their unborn babies thus escaped harm. Aruna Ro

Grave error? Scholar blames ex-Gujarat babu for anti-Christian riots 'citing fake report'

By Rajiv Shah A few days back, I received a message from one of the finest former Gujarat government bureaucrats, PG Ramrakhiani, a 1964 batch IAS official, who retired in November 2000. I would often interact with him in 1997-99, even later, after I was sent to Gandhinagar as a Times of India man to cover Sachivalaya. Those were turbulent times. Shankarsinh Vaghela was the Gujarat chief minister, under attack from two sides – from the BJP, which he had left to form a separate breakaway party, Rashtriya Janata Party (RJP), one one hand, and the Congress, which was supporting him from outside, on the other. Ramrakhiani, in his message, referred to the book authored by Ghanshyam Shah and Jan Breman, both top-notch scholars who have known Gujarat in and out. Called “Gujarat, Cradle and Harbinger of Identity Politics: India’s Injurious Frame of Communalism”, I reviewed the book in January 2022. It claims that Muslims in Gujarat have been turned into “new untouchables”, thanks to the Hin

Excess to cheetah in Kuno to increase 'woes' of local people, 'disturb' wildlife balance

Bharat Dogra* The release of eight cheetahs into the Kuno National Park ( Madhya Pradesh) by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on September 17, although accompanied by a media blitz, has raised several questions. The animals were flown from Namibia to Gwalior and from there they were taken to the release site in a helicopter. Official sources have stated that this is the first time a large carnivorous species has been moved across continents for establishing a new population. This first release will be followed by others under this project. However, precisely for this reason, it is important to be cautious because if such translocations have been generally avoided in the past, there may have been reasons for this and at the same time we do not have much learning experiences from the past. The Cheetah became extinct in India in 1952, although this very fast moving animal is still remembered in the folklore of many areas. Hence the first impulse is to say that trying to introduce and revive

Introducing non-native cheetahs is 'not equivalent' to restoring pride in the nation

By Bappaditya Mukhopadhyay* The Cheetahs from the African continent has finally been introduced to India by the Indian Prime Minister on his 72nd birthday. The process had started with the previous Government in 2009. However, the Supreme Court clearance was pending owing to the objection by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) plea to reintroduce cheetahs. Finally the clearance was obtained in January 2020 and thereafter Kuno National Park (KNP) was chosen for the reintroduction of first set of Southeast African Cheetahs. In the near future, depending upon the success story of the current reintroduction, more cheetahs from South Africa may also be introduced. This exercise has generated a lot of interest among various stakeholders with opinions on both sides galore. It is important to pose some questions that surround the whole exercise. Let us evaluate some of these arguments. The first set of arguments are quite detached from the issues of conservation as they most

'Military diplomacy': US praises Bangladesh Army for leadership role in UN operations

By Kamal Uddin Mazumder* As the Indo-Pacific region represents the world’s economic and strategic center of gravity, the Indian Ocean today is becoming the centerpiece of all geo-strategic play. Cooperation in the region is crucial to implementing the international community’s global agenda, including achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. Major powers like the US have enhanced and deepened their strategic engagement and leadership roles with countries in the region. The Indo-Pacific Army Management Seminar, or IPAMS, is a U.S. Army Pacific (USARPAC) initiated conference that is aimed at facilitating and enhancing interactions among the armies of the Indo-Pacific region. This year's 46th Indo-Pacific Armies Management Seminar (IPAMS)-2022, co-hosted by the Bangladesh Army and US Army Pacific (USARPAC), concluded in Dhaka. The objective of IPAMS is to promote peace and stability in the region through mutual understanding, dialogue, and friendship. It is the largest confer

Buddhist shrines were 'massively destroyed' by Brahmanical rulers: Historian DN Jha

Nalanda mahavihara By Our Representative Prominent historian DN Jha, an expert in India's ancient and medieval past, in his new book , "Against the Grain: Notes on Identity, Intolerance and History", in a sharp critique of "Hindutva ideologues", who look at the ancient period of Indian history as "a golden age marked by social harmony, devoid of any religious violence", has said, "Demolition and desecration of rival religious establishments, and the appropriation of their idols, was not uncommon in India before the advent of Islam".

Counterview

Search This Blog