Sep 21, 2013

Before Shit Hits The Fan


Some time back, while surveying the low income areas of Madhya Pradesh to start a sanitation project, an woman member of  NGO stopped by one of the houses to drink water. However, she was taken aback to see the women of house looking horrified as she drank an entire glass of water. When she asked the reason for their surprise, she was told that, no matter how thirsty they were, women in that area could never take the risk of drinking a full glass of water at one go during the day. Surprisingly, it was not the quality of the water that compelled women to drink less of it, but their 'imprisonment by daylight'. With no toilets inside the house or in the village, women and girls must go to the nearby fields to relieve themselves. But modesty forbids them to do so during the daytime when they are in full view of men. They have no choice but to limit themselves to a few sips of water all day, so that they can wait until dark before needing to use the fields. Although sometimes a newlywed woman leaves her husband's home and returns only after a toilet is built, largely the women folk of India remained "Imprisoned by Daylight".
India sanitation cell phoneIn the shadow of its new suburbs, torrid growth and 300-million-plus-strong middle class, India is struggling with a sanitation emergency. From the stream in village to the nation’s holiest river, the Ganges, 75 percent of the country’s surface water is contaminated by human and agricultural waste and industrial effluent. Everyone in Indian cities is at risk of consuming human feces, if they’re not already, the Ministry of Urban Development concluded. A report by the WHO and the UNICEF says that India has a shocking number of 58% of all people who defecate in the open. China and Indonesia share the second place with just 5% of their population not having toilets. Pakistan and Ethiopia are third with 4.5% such people.


As Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh recently described the Indian Railways as “the world’s biggest open toilet”. “We are the world’s capital for open defecations. 60 percent of all open defecations in the world are in India. This is a matter of great shame,” he added. A government panel report mentions that human waste from open-discharge toilets used by passengers is damaging railway tracks as the PH value found in human urine and excreta is leading to corrosion of tracks.
No matter whether you travel by roads or railways, it can be easily witnessed that India has indeed become an open defecating ground. Is this problem restricted to the poor and the top 5%, of which you and I are a part, insulated ? As per a series of studies on the impact of open defecation on child stunting, by Dean Spears, an economist “elite top 2.5 percent of the Indian population: children who live in urban homes with flush toilets that they do not share with other households; whose mothers are literate and have been to secondary school; and whose families have electricity, a radio, a refrigerator, and a motorcycle or car.” Does this malnutrition seep in to our lives ? The children in this elite sub-set too are shorter than expected, “because 7 percent of the households living near even these rich children defecate in the open”, as per Dean Spears data.
Programs like "Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan" has been started by the Government Of India (Details here) for the poorest who cannot afford making a toilet.
Meanwhile Madhya Pradesh continues with the highest "fraction of households practicing open defecation" along with the states of UP and Bihar. As a consequence of this high percentage of Open Defecators, 60% Children (<5 Yrs) of MP are underweight. For every 100 children born in Madhya Pradesh, 6 do not survive till their 1st birthday, 8 do not survive till their 5th birthday , 45 do not receive full immunization and 60 children are underweight by age 3.
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Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe are 2 to 4.5 less likely to have access to improved sanitation.
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What is particularly intriguing is the 2% of the richest community who continue with Open Defecation. The obvious answer is a urgent change of mindset.

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While enjoying the political fireworks in the state run-up for another round of elections and possible regime change, let us keep in mind that no government will talk about this taboo subject affecting the daily lives. This problem no longer effects the  economically weaker section, but the shit is actually about to hit the fan or even the air conditioner. Society has to the initiative and start changing the mindset at ground level.

[This post is in collaboration with UNICEF India‘s No To Open Defecation campaign. In spite of high growth and higher claims of political leadership, 60% children below 5 yrs of Madhya Pradesh are malnourished - highest in the country. Open Defecation directly contributes to this statistic]







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