At Your Convenience – Kanti Bajpai
Times of India 28-2-15
India needs a sanitation
policy, not just more toilets
Indians are toilet deprived.
Two-thirds of rural Indians have no access to toilets. In some parts of the
country, the statistic is even worse. Nationally, only about 50% of the
population has toilet access. In the second decade of the 21st century, this is
a disgrace, and its physical and social consequences are massive.
Poor sanitation has ensured
that Indians have amongst the highest rates of malnutrition, stunting and
mental retardation in the world. Hygiene problems lead to almost chronic
gastrointestinal infections which cause undernourishment which, in turn,
produce stunting and retardation. We are talking about tens of millions of Indians
afflicted in this way.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi
to his credit has made improved sanitation a key policy objective of his
government. He is the first Indian leader since Mahatma Gandhi to talk
repeatedly about this almost taboo subject. He is not just talking about it; he
is trying to do something fairly monumental for us. Since Modi’s coming to
power, the government has built half a million toilets. It may well build
another 100 million in the next few years.
Surely most of the sanitation
problem will go away if we provide the majority of Indians with toilet access.
Wrong.
Without a full-blown
sanitation policy we won’t make much of a dent in the problem. Of course,
providing sufficient toilets is part of the solution. But going by the
experience of other countries, including those like Bangladesh and China which
have made huge gains in this area, and our own history of toilet provisioning,
this is the easiest part of a sanitation campaign.
The most difficult part is
getting people to use the toilets.
Indians don’t use toilets for
many reasons. Some toilets are too far away to use. Some don’t have a light
bulb in it and become inoperative at night. Some are located in places that are
not safe for women and children. Many if not most public toilets just don’t
work. There are no toilet seats, flushes don’t flush, cubicle doors are broken,
there is no water and the smell, filth and insects drive patrons away. Toilets
are not cleaned, the cleaning staff doesn’t get cleaning equipment (because
someone has stolen it), supervisors are lackadaisical and absentee cleaners go
scot free. In short, we have the usual Indian administrative story.
There is another problem.
Mihir S Sharma in his book Restart: The Last Chance for the Indian Economy
tells us that perhaps 80% of rural Hindus use the fields, while only 50% of
Muslims do so. Up to 40% of Hindus who have access to a “working government
latrine” won’t use it, whereas only 7% of Muslims who have similar access will
defecate outside. Since Hindus make up over 80% of the population, their
attitudes and practices are a big part of the challenge ahead.
The problem does not end
there, as Singapore realised several decades ago.
You not only have to get
people to use toilets; they must use them properly. In public facilities, on
Western toilets, they must resist the temptation to squat. They must leave the
seat dry. They must wash their hands, even when they urinate. They must flush.
Public toilets need soap, disposable paper towels, and, in all likelihood,
toilet paper (since otherwise toilet seats cannot be kept dry for the next
person).
The prime minister has started
a debate and a process. More than building toilets, he must develop and deploy
a sanitation policy – which deals with management of human waste all the way
from our bodies to sewage disposal in our rivers, lakes and seas. The latter is
vital. We will achieve little if we do not attend to where human waste goes and
what is done to it after it has been deposited in a toilet bowl or urinal.
Narendra Modi is no fool. He
is aware that he has taken on a massive task. However, as Bangladesh and other
countries poorer than India have shown, sanitation is achievable relatively
quickly. A determined leader and dedicated administration in partnership with
civil society and citizens could give us a sanitation revolution.
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