| Analysis of coverage data from various sources shows
that despite the acceleration of coverage under the Eighth Plan,
only 19.2 per cent of rural households have a toilet. However, at
the same time 80 per cent of all urban households in India have
toilets, an increase from the 1990 figures of around 64 per cent
. According to NFHS-3 (2005-2006), only 29 per cent of households
have improved toilet facilities (which include toilet facilities
with a flush, or a pour flush that is connected to a sewer system,
septic tank or pit latrine, a ventilated improved pit (VIP) latrine,
a biogas latrine, a pit latrine with slab and twin pit, composting
toilet). Percentage of households having no toilet facility in urban
India showed a steady decline from NFHS-2 (19 per cent) to NFHS-3
(17 per cent)
The higher percentages of urban sanitation have largely been
due to private initiatives at the household level and due to high
concentration of household toilets in the larger urban metro cities.
As far as waste water drainage management is concerned, only 3.9
per cent of the total households in rural India have the closed
drainage system of waste water while in urban India 34.5 per cent
of the total households have closed drainage facility. There is
very high percentage of urban households without any drainage
system at all.
Actions taken by Government
Adopted one pit latrine in rural sanitation.
Running total sanitation campaign in rural area.
Adopted urban sanitation policy in 2008.
Providing money for building toilets.
Government passed a law in 1993, banning employment of manual
scavengers and construction of dry latrines.
Advocacy to Government
1. Government should adopt two pit latrines for rural sanitation.
2. Government should give loans to people to build toilets.
3. Train people as missionaries of sanitation to motivate and
implement.
4. These missionaries should be able to earn their own living.
5. Government should pay money as incentive as subsidy for building
toilets.
6. Government should invest in toilets for above poverty line
before investing for toilets for below poverty line.
7. Government should convert remaining dry toilets to flush toilets.
8. Government should not provide total cost of construction, but
only provide incentive component, with some money being spent
by beneficiary.
9. Media should high light the problem of sanitation.
10. Sulabh technology may be explored for urban sanitation.
Statistics
According to Sulabh Shauchalaya, 57% of rural Indian has toilets.
According to Sulabh Shauchalya 67% of urban Indian have toilets.
Yet 600 million Indian defecate in open. 1 million toilets are
cleaned by scavengers. Sulabh Shauchalaya statistics extrapolated
from Census of 2001 figures.
However there are alternate statistics for rural sanitation from
Government of India.
Year Percentage with access to toilets(%)
1981 1
1991 9.5
2001 22
2008 57
Government figures for urban sanitation are
Year Percentage with access to toilets (%)
1961 21
1971 24
1981 58
1991 63
2001 73
2008 83
However these figures may be suspect. Urban sanitation improved
in 1970s due to conversion from dry latrine to Sulabh technology.
The sanitation coverage among rural households has increased
from 21.9 percent in 2001 to 27.3 percent in 2004 and has more
than doubled since then to 63.91 per cent (of 2001 Census households)
as on May 20, 2009. The total Sanitation Campaign (TSC) is one
of the eight flagship programmes of the Government. TSC projects
have been sanctioned in 593 rural districts of the country at
a total outlay of Rs. 17,885 crore with a Central share of Rs.
11,094 crore. Since 1999, over 5.56 crore toilets have been provided
for rural households under TSC. A significant achievement has
also been the construction of of 8.71 lakh school toilets and
2.72 lakh Anganwadi toilets. With increasing budgetary allocations
and focus on rural areas, the number of households being provided
with toilets annually has increased from only 24.41 lakh in 2002-03
to 98.7 lakh in 2006-07.
Government recently conducted a study on urban sanitation and
rated cities on sanitation. The process of data collection was
carried out between December 2009 and March 2010 and was subsequently
scrutinised in April by a team of experts. Each city has been
scored on 19 indicators which are divided into three categories:
Output (50 points), Process (30 points) and Outcome (20 points).
There are four cities in the blue category which have scored above
66 but less than 90 marks out of hundred. Almost all cities report
complete elimination of manual scavenging. More than 50 cities,
report 90 percent or above safe collection of human excreta. Twenty
four cities collect more than 80 percent of their solid wastes
– another six show an outstanding performance of nearly 100 percent
primary collection. While treatment is a big challenge for most,
17 cities have achieved treating at least 60 percent of their
wastes. Most cities have performed well in the process indicators,
especially the larger cities, but results for the output and outcome
indicators are mixed.
The exercise also highlights that considerable efforts are required
to improve access to community and public toilets for the urban
poor and to stop open-defecation. Wastewater treatment poses considerable
challenges – 380 cities collect and treat less than 40% of their
human excreta, though there are six cities that treat more than
90% of their human excreta.
It is expected that the ratings will help in bringing city sanitation
in focus in all States and Cities. With significant enhancement
in grants for urban local bodies under 13th Finance Commission
recommendations, and assistance available under schemes like Jawaharlal
Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission, Urban Infrastructure Scheme
for Small and Medium Towns, Infrastructure Development Scheme
for Satellite Towns, North Eastern Region Urban Development Programme,
Backward Region Grant Fund, multilateral and bilateral funds and
significant initiatives by States themselves, it should be indeed
possible to move towards better levels of sanitation and the ratings
seek to trigger this much needed change.
Only 23 cities out of 48 cities in 1952-57 had sewerage. Now in
2008, there are 5161 towns and there are 160 towns have sewerage.
Construction of sewerage is expensive and almost impossible to
achieve complete sewerage in short time frame. Sulabh technology
can be used till complete sewerage is achieved.
Sulabh Shauchalaya has built 1.2 million house toilets. Sulabh
Shauchalaya has built 7500 public toilets. More than 10 million
people Sulabh Shauchalaya toilets every day.
Sulabh Shauchalaya has 60,000 Associates, of which 35000 receive
payment and 25000 are volunteers.
RURAL INDIA IS AWASH IN A SANITATION
REVOLUTION
N. C. Saxena, Former Secretary, Planning Commission Toilets are
not an issue for you and me. But for millions in India’s
villages, the absence of a toilet is a reality. For many it’s
not even a need that is felt. For others, it is a question of
financial priorities. Over 700 million people in India still live
without proper sanitation. The resulting poor hygiene is responsible
for approximately 1,000 children under five years dying every
day due to diarrhoea alone. Poor hygiene, lack of sanitation and
inadequate or unsafe water together contribute to about 88 per
cent of diarrhoea deaths.
The fact is that sanitation issues did not command sufficient
public investment till the end of the 1970s. A total of 108 million
man-days, which is equivalent to Rs 12 billion, are lost every
year due to sanitation related diseases. Sanitation acquired importance
only in the 1980s when the Government of India encouraged the
construction of household toilets in the villages under the Central
Rural Sanitation Programme.
However, the programme did not become a major sucess as it promoted
a single design at a single price and gave a high subsidy with
limited funds available. As a result, the government was only
able to allot one or two latrines per village and this often went
to the prominent members. The subsequent Total Sanitation Campaign
has sought to increase toilet construction and usage by shifting
to low subsidies and a greater stress on creating household
involvement through awareness. Its sucess is evident from the
fact that while in 1997-98, only about 1.3 million toilets were
built, in 2003-04 the figure jumped to over 6 million, followed
by over 9 million toilets being built in 2006-07. It is expected
that the number of household toilets constructed during 2007-08
may actually exceed a crore.
The key to this sucess has been the involvement of the Panchayati
Raj Institutions (PRI) under the Nirmal Gram Puraskar, the incentive
award scheme. The PRIs have been motivated to promote sanitation
in their community by influencing behavioural change and creating
a demand. The Nirmal Gram Puraskar awards have seen an enormous
increase in the number of awards from across the country from
40 PRIs awarded in 2004-05.
Approximately, 30,000 PRIs have already applied for the award
in 2008. All this has meant that states like West Bengal, Tamil
Nadu and Andhra Pradesh are close to achieving the ‘Millennium
Development Targets’. While it is important to celebrate
the gains made in increasing sanitation coverage nationwide, we
must not forget that it is only the beginning, there is a long
way to go before total sanitation is achieved. The challenge ahead
is not only to maintain the momentum, but also to accelerate the
pace of sanitation coverage.
Although 40 million households have been reached so far, there
is still more than 70 million households across the country without
toilets. The Total Sanitation Campaign and Nirmal Gram Puraskar
have shown that sanitation is
achievable. But before we turn the page, we must know that the
campaign needs consistent and dedicated support. What we need
is not a spring cleaning but a sea change conducted on a war footing.
National Urban Sanitation Policy
Sanitation is defined as safe management of human excreta, including
its safe
confinement treatment, disposal and associated hygiene-related
practices. While this policy pertains to management of human excreta
and associated public health and environmental impacts, it is
recognized that integral solutions need to take account of other
elements of environmental sanitation, i.e. solid waste management;
generation of industrial and other specialized / hazardous wastes;
drainage; as also the management of drinking water supply.
According to Census 2001, 27.8% of Indians, i.e. 286 million
people or 55 million households live in urban areas1 – projections
indicate that the urban population would have grown to 331 million
people by 2007 and to 368 million by 2012. 12.04 million (7.87
%) Urban households do not have access to latrines and defecate
in the open. 5.48 million (8.13%) Urban households use community
latrines and 13.4 million households (19.49%) use shared latrines.
12.47 million (18.5%) households do not have access to a drainage
network. 26.83 million (39.8%) households are connected to open
drains. The status in
respect of the urban poor is even worse. The percentage of notified
and non-notified slums without latrines is 17 percent and 51 percent
respectively. In respect of septic latrines the availability is
66 percent and 35 percent. In respect of underground sewerage,
the availability is 30 percent and 15 percent respectively. More
than 37% of the total human excreta generated in urban India,
is unsafely disposed. This imposes significant public health and
environmental costs to urban areas that contribute more than 60%
of the
country’s GDP. Impacts of poor sanitation are especially
significant for the urban poor (22% of total urban population),
women, children and the elderly. The loss due to diseases caused
by poor sanitation for children under 14 years alone in urban
areas amounts to Rs. 500 Crore at 2001 prices (Planning Commission-United
Nations International Children Emergency Fund (UNICEF), 2006).
Inadequate discharge of untreated domestic/municipal wastewater
has resulted in contamination of 75 percent of all surface water
across India.
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) enjoin upon the signatory
nations to extend access to improved sanitation to at least half
the urban population by 2015, and 100% access by 2025. This implies
extending coverage to households without improved sanitation,
and providing proper sanitation facilities in public places to
make cities opendefecation free.
Read
More
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Global Level
Clean water and adequate sanitation are two critical
factors in ensuring human health and protection against a wide
range of diseases. The International Decade for Action: “Water
for Life” 2005-2015 calls on the international community
to strengthen efforts to increase access to water and sanitation
for all by 2015 in order to combat disease and improve the health
and well-being of the world’s population.
The challenge
Lack of safe water and adequate sanitation is the world’s
single largest cause of illness. Two million people, most of them
children, die every year from water-borne diseases, such as diarrhoea,
and millions become seriously debilitated.
Lack of safe water and poor management of human wastes can spread
such diseases as diarrhoea, cholera, dysentery, typhoid, hepatitis,
polio, trachoma and tapeworms—many of which can be fatal
to people in the developing world. Other water-associated diseases,
such as malaria and filariasis, affect vast populations worldwide.
More than 1 million people die every year from malaria alone.
Unsafe water and lack of sanitation are major factors underlying
many of the 10 million child deaths every year. Repeated episodes
of waterborne diseases like diarrhoea can push children to the
brink of survival, leaving them too weak and malnourished to survive
even common childhood illnesses.
Most of these deaths are preventable. It is estimated that almost
half of the nearly 2 million deaths from diarrhoea every year
could be prevented through an understanding of basic hygiene.
Water scarcity forces people to consume contaminated water, leading
to water-borne diseases. In 2005, half a billion people lived
in countries defined as water-stressed or water-scarce. This figure
is expected to increase to 2.4 billion and 3.4 billion, respectively,
by 2025, with North Africa and West Asia particularly affected.
Increased urbanization is placing an enormous strain on existing
water and sanitation infrastructure. Urban centres in developing
countries have grown rapidly without adequate infrastructure planning,
resulting in millions of immigrants who have little access to
safe sanitation or water supplies. This puts the entire population
at risk, causing serious environmental damage.
Growing numbers of HIV-positive people, who are especially susceptible
to disease and infection, depend on clean water for their health
and survival.
What needs to be done?
The “Water for Life” Decade is an opportunity to increase
efforts to provide safe water and sanitation for all by 2015 and
to ensure a healthy living environment.
Recommendations for action include
Effective and sustained advocacy on water, sanitation and hygiene
at all levels. Many decision makers underestimate the critical
role that water, hygiene and sanitation play in poverty alleviation.
The economic and health benefits of providing access to water
and sanitation facilities significantly outweigh the cost of investment.
Water, sanitation and hygiene education programmes in every school
will have a profound impact on the health of children, on learning,
on the teaching environment and on girls’ education.
Investment in sanitation infrastructure, such as latrines and
toilets, in homes and in every school is critical to provision
of a healthy environment and a sustainable health policy. In areas
affected by high unemployment, villagers can be engaged as latrine
builders, masons and water pump operation and maintenance stewards.
Focus on long-term, sustainable service delivery in addition
to the construction of facilities.
Involve women fully in the planning and design of water and sanitation
facilities and look at water and sanitation issues from a gender
perspective. Successful training of women in hygiene and sanitation
practices will improve the health of the entire population.
Involve the community to ensure long-term solutions. Community
approval and commitment to safe sanitation has proved critical
to the grassroots success of water and sanitation projects, especially
in rural areas. Empowered communities manage water supply and
sanitation programmes that achieve long-term success.
Prioritize water and sanitation in disaster-response planning.
People affected by natural and manmade disasters are more likely
to become ill and die from diseases related to inadequate or contaminated
water and lack of adequate sanitation than from any other single
cause. There is an urgent need to develop minimum standards for
post-disaster sanitation as well as emergency sanitation services.
Source
Sulabh Sauchalaya
Sulabh Shauchalaya started sanitation movement
in 1970s and has campaigned for sanitation for past 40 years.
Inadequate sanitation cost India almost $54 billion or 6.4% of
the country’s GDP in 2006. Over 70% of this economic impact or
about $38.5 billion was health-related with diarrhoea followed
by acute lower respiratory infections accounting for 12% of health
related impacts.
These estimates are from ‘‘The Economic Impacts of Inadequate
Sanitation in India’’, a recent by the Water and Sanitation Program
(WSP), a global partnership administered by the World Bank.
More than three-fourth of the premature mortality-related economic
losses are due to deaths and diseases in children younger than
five.
Diarrhoea among these children accounts for over 47% of the total
health-related impact of nearly $ 18 bn.
The report estimates that in rural areas, where 50% of households
are said to have access to improved sanitation, there are almost
575 million people defecating in the open. Similarly, in urban
areas where 60-70 % of the households are said to have access
to sanitation, 54 million people defecate in the open and over
60% of the waste water is discharged untreated.
This has led to huge public health costs, besides causing 450,000
deaths. It has led to an estimated 575 million cases of diarrhoea,
and 350,000 deaths from diarrhoea alone, in the under-five age
group.
It is the poorest who bear the greatest cost due to inadequate
sanitation.
The poorest fifth of the urban population bears the highest per
capita economic impact of Rs 1,699, much more than the national
average per capita loss due to inadequate sanitation, which is
Rs 961. Among rural households too, the poorest fifth bears the
highest per capita loss in the rural area at over Rs 1,000.
Health impacts, accounting for the bulk of the economic impacts,
are followed by the economic losses due to the time spent in obtaining
piped water and sanitation facilities , about $15 billion, and
about $0.26 billion of potential tourism revenue lost due to India’s
reputation for poor sanitation, the report says
Challenges
1. Total sewerage is almost impossible, because the cost of total
sewerage is very expensive. Sewerage costs Rs. 27,000 per capita.
2. There is no culture of sanitation historically.
3. Political class is disconnected to poor people who lack sanitation.
4. Sanitation policies are being planned by people without experience.
5. Government figures depend on outlays, and not on outcome. Hence
measuring that can trigger change is lacking in sanitation.
Central Government
Actions taken by Government
1. Government adopted one pit latrine in rural sanitation.
2. Government is running total sanitation campaign in rural area.
3. Government has adopted urban sanitation policy in 2008.
4. Government is providing money for building toilets.
Advocacy to Government
1. Government should adopt two pit latrines for rural sanitation.
2. Government should give loans to people to build toilets.
3. Train people as missionaries of sanitation to motivate and
implement.
4. These missionaries should be able to earn their own living.
5. Government should pay money as incentive as subsidy for building
toilets.
6. Government should invest in toilets for above poverty line
before investing for toilets for below poverty line.
7. Government should convert remaining dry toilets to flush toilets.
8. Government should not provide total cost of construction, but
only provide incentive component, with some money being spent
by beneficiary.
9. Media should high light the problem of sanitation.
10. Sulabh technology may be explored for urban sanitation
Statistics
According to Sulabh Shauchalaya, 57% of rural Indian has toilets.
According to Sulabh Shauchalya 67% of urban Indian have toilets.
Yet 600 million Indian defecate in open. 1 million toilets are
cleaned by scavengers. Sulabh Shauchalaya statistics extrapolated
from Census of 2001 figures.
However there are alternate statistics for rural sanitation from
Government of India.
Year Percentage with access to toilets(%)
1981 1
1991 9.5
2001 22
2008 57
Government figures for urban sanitation are
Year Percentage with access to toilets (%)
1961 21
1971 24
1981 58
1991 63
2001 73
2008 83
However these figures may be suspect. Urban sanitation improved
in 1970s due to conversion from dry latrine to Sulabh technology.
The sanitation coverage among rural households has increased
from 21.9 percent in 2001 to 27.3 percent in 2004 and has more
than doubled since then to 63.91 per cent (of 2001 Census households)
as on May 20, 2009. The total Sanitation Campaign (TSC) is one
of the eight flagship programmes of the Government. TSC projects
have been sanctioned in 593 rural districts of the country at
a total outlay of Rs. 17,885 crore with a Central share of Rs.
11,094 crore. Since 1999, over 5.56 crore toilets have been provided
for rural households under TSC. A significant achievement has
also been the construction of of 8.71 lakh school toilets and
2.72 lakh Anganwadi toilets. With increasing budgetary allocations
and focus on rural areas, the number of households being provided
with toilets annually has increased from only 24.41 lakh in 2002-03
to 98.7 lakh in 2006-07.
Government recently conducted a study on urban sanitation and
rated cities on sanitation. The process of data collection was
carried out between December 2009 and March 2010 and was subsequently
scrutinised in April by a team of experts. Each city has been
scored on 19 indicators which are divided into three categories:
Output (50 points), Process (30 points) and Outcome (20 points).
There are four cities in the blue category which have scored above
66 but less than 90 marks out of hundred. Almost all cities report
complete elimination of manual scavenging. More than 50 cities,
report 90 percent or above safe collection of human excreta. Twenty
four cities collect more than 80 percent of their solid wastes
– another six show an outstanding performance of nearly 100 percent
primary collection. While treatment is a big challenge for most,
17 cities have achieved treating at least 60 percent of their
wastes. Most cities have performed well in the process indicators,
especially the larger cities, but results for the output and outcome
indicators are mixed.
The exercise also highlights that considerable efforts are required
to improve access to community and public toilets for the urban
poor and to stop open-defecation. Wastewater treatment poses considerable
challenges – 380 cities collect and treat less than 40% of their
human excreta, though there are six cities that treat more than
90% of their human excreta.
It is expected that the ratings will help in bringing city sanitation
in focus in all States and Cities. With significant enhancement
in grants for urban local bodies under 13th Finance Commission
recommendations, and assistance available under schemes like Jawaharlal
Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission, Urban Infrastructure Scheme
for Small and Medium Towns, Infrastructure Development Scheme
for Satellite Towns, North Eastern Region Urban Development Programme,
Backward Region Grant Fund, multilateral and bilateral funds and
significant initiatives by States themselves, it should be indeed
possible to move towards better levels of sanitation and the ratings
seek to trigger this much needed change.
Only 23 cities out of 48 cities in 1952-57 had sewerage. Now in
2008, there are 5161 towns and there are 160 towns have sewerage.
Construction of sewerage is expensive and almost impossible to
achieve complete sewerage in short time frame. Sulabh technology
can be used till complete sewerage is achieved.
Sulabh Shauchalaya has built 1.2 million house toilets. Sulabh
Shauchalaya has built 7500 public toilets. More than 10 million
people Sulabh Shauchalaya toilets every day.
Sulabh Shauchalaya has 60,000 Associates, of which 35000 receive
payment and 25000 are volunteers.
|
