Why This Blog

India's charismatic new Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, in his first address to the Nation on its 68th Independence day - August 15, 2014, openly talked about a taboo subject-- that of Poo and Loo. Thousands had gathered there, and millions were glued to their television sets. Much was expected from him in announcements of sweeping reforms, economic growth, job creation, safety of women and so on. He had been elected on his promises to put development and change in the country.

Modi's was dressed like a bride's father at a traditional Indian wedding -- in colorful Jodhpur style flowing turban. He spoke without notes and made animated gestures with both hands.  He was the personification of leadership. He noted that half of the nation's population did not have access to household latrines and that it was a matter of shame for the country for half its people not having a latrine in their homes. Never before had a  Prime Minister spoken with such candor on this taboo topic, although world agencies had identified the problem and its devastating impact on to public health. This is a topic that is rarely mentioned in common parley. We Indians use euphemisms in referring to toilet -- constitutional, excreta, stools. or defecation. We say poo, poop, loo, du-du, can, motion, 'going', bladder problem, front/back door, can, bath room, wash-room, night-soil, morning chores. morning ablution, making fertilizer and so on.

People in different linguistic States use their own terms such as Helu, Kakkas, Sandas, Doddi, Paikhana, ..... Further more, the reference word of one person is unlikely to be meaningful to a person of a different language.


Judging from the response of people across India, Modi has inspired people. As the Sanskrit proverb says, yatha rajah, tatha prajah (however acts the top man, so do the people at lower levels)

This blog is a compendium of the reactions, elaboration of the challenges, the linkage of diseases with open toilets, the behavioral changes needed and success reports. The objective of this blog is to open up a forum where the thinking and the doing, as well as honest feedback and stumbling blocks to this nation building activity get reported; This is also a means of evoking new thinking.

 The subject had always been referred to in euphemistic or connotative words, but denotative words were a no-no, considered embarrassing and not in good style. In typical referral people talk about going to --: going to the can, du-doing, pooping, going to the office, going for a constitutional, regularity, motion, night soil, crap, shit/shitting, pee/peeing, taking a leak, output, morning ablution, human-manure/fertilizer, going with the water-pot, left-hand work or simply going. Nobody referred to it as defecation, excreta, and such other denotative words.

Not only did Modi spoke about it, but went on to announce how many million of these out-houses would be created through government funds. That was brazen disregard of the Indian norm of what a government should be concerned with. People were expecting announcements with respect to more job creation, inflation, agriculture, banking and so on.

Indians take their lead from charismatic leaders. Perhaps we are 'authoritarian' personalities, that require an inspiring leader. Perhaps we are not entrepreneurial and individualistic enough. Now that the Prime Minister has talked about it openly, there are reports in newspapers how bad the situation is, what the progress has been in building toilets,what the conservative attitudes have been, the resistance to change, and innovations in toilet design, and so forth.  This blog is an attempt to bring all of this in one place and encourage dialog and discussion about the issues around this aspect of sanitation in India.
 

Links

http://www.dasra.org/dasra http://indiasanitationportal.org/18564
http://gatesfoundation.isebox.net/water-sanitation-hygiene/reinvent-the-toilet-fair-india http://abettertoilet.org/delhi/
http://www.sulabhinternational.org
www.poo2loo.com/
https://twitter.com/poo2loohttps://www.facebook.com/poo2loo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0CMtwfNIa4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0CMtwfNIa4www.youtube.com/watch?v=_peUxE_BKcU

Nani (M.P.) bats for bio-toilets

• By Special Correspondent, www.thehindu.com
• January 13th, 2015

 

Special Arrangement MP Kesineni Nani addressing the participants of Youth Parliament, organised by ‘Vijayawada Needs U’, in the city on Saturday. 

Vijayawada MP Kesineni Srinivas (Nani) has said that he is intended to introduce bio-toilets using DRDO’s bio-digester technology.

At a meeting organised in connection with the first Youth Parliament, organised by Vijayawada Needs U, a city-based student organisation, the MP said: “I want to introduce at least 1,000 bio-toilets before my term ends.”

He was speaking at a meeting organised in connection with the first Youth Parliament, organised by Vijayawada Needs U, a city-based student organisation.

Admitting that populist schemes introduced by the TDP in its last tenure had failed to reach the grass roots level, which had kept the party out of power, he said: “This time, Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu ensured a good balance between the two important factors. A State should be investor-friendly while the needs of the sections in the lower strata of society should be given equal importance,” he said.

Referring to the poor sanitation of the residents living on the hill slopes in One Town area, he said that nearly 10,000 people were using a few community toilets and the sanitation of this area should be improved.

Speaking about Gollamandala in A. Kondur mandal of Krishna district, a remote village he has adopted, he said that efforts would be made to groom it into a model village in the country.

Municipalities help Vijayawada Railway Division in its cleanliness drive

By V. Raghavendra, www.thehindu.com                       January 13th, 2015

Vijayawada Railway Division officials sought the help of 25 municipalities in keeping its tracks and boundaries clean as part of the ongoing Clean India Mission (‘Swachh Bharat Abhiyan) and all of them came forward to make workers available and also material to some extent. On its part, the Railway Division is pressing earth-movers and its own personnel into service for cleaning up the mess.

Some of the municipal commissioners have come for inspections on railway trolleys and seen for themselves what they could do to improve the conditions around stations and tracks, said Divisional Railway Manager Pradeep Kumar.

Addressing media persons here on Friday, Mr. Kumar said on-board house keeping was provided in seven pairs of trains that originate in the division at Vijayawada, Kakinada, Machilipatnam and Narsapur and bio-toilets were functional in 168 coaches in three originating trains (Machilipatnam - Secunderabad Express, Machilipatnam-Yeswanthpur Kondaveedu Express and Narsapur-Nagarsol Express. Construction of a bio-toilet was just finished at Ongole station and another one was planned for Machilipatnam.

Vijayawada and Guntakal stations which were Clean Train Stations were paid the attention they deserved. Supervisors were deputed to take care of cleanliness in all trains that originate in the division and pass-through trains at Vijayawada and Tenali where trains halt for 10 to 15 minutes. RALLY: Nearly 500 officers and staff would take out a rally from Electric Traction Training Centre at Satyanarayanapuram to the railway station as part of the cleanliness drive which is going on throughout the country on September 30.

Students test sanitation system in India using breathable fabric technology

Science Daily, January, 2015

Breathable fabric used in field test traps waste and allows only tiny water vapor molecules through.

 Credit: Evan Krape, University of Delaware

A team of researchers led by Steven K. Dentel, professor of civil and environmental engineering (University of Delaware), has been working for several years on a breathable fabric that can be used to line pit toilets and other basic sanitary facilities in developing nations.

Approximately 2.5 billion people around the world are still without adequate sanitation, which leads to water contamination responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. About a billion people still have to defecate in the open, without any privacy or sanitary facilities.

The fabric Dentel and his team are developing is similar to that used in sports jackets and raincoats; it only allows tiny water vapor molecules through.

Dentel realized this could be a valuable way to filter out liquid water from human waste, letting the pure water escape while retaining everything else. Sewage placed in a container of this fabric would become dehydrated and therefore less hospitable to bacteria and other disease-causing organisms.

Funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the project has been in the works for some time. The lab results look promising, but must still be tested in the field.

On Dec. 28, a small group led by doctoral student Shray Saxena headed to India to begin the first field test of the new fabric.

"A lot of people in India right now don't have improved toilet systems," says Saxena. "Even in cities like Kanpur, which are really quite developed, people do not have these facilities available to them."

Because sanitation in these cities is often decentralized, an advantage of this disposal system is that it does not require connection to central water or sewage lines.

Families in two cities, Kanpur and Puri, are trying out the new "eco-vapor" toilet system, with sewage collected in 55-gallon drums lined with the breathable fabric, allowing water vapor to evaporate.

The group is observing how the fabric performs under varying conditions of heat and humidity, which affect the rate at which water diffuses through the membrane. If external humidity is high, the lined drums may fill up before enough of the water can evaporate.

The nongovernmental organization WaterAid India is partnering with the research group on site selection and implementation of the pilot project.

In addition to Saxena, the team that went to India included Paul Imhoff, professor of civil and environmental engineering, doctoral student Babak Ebraziakhshayesh and two undergraduate students, Kelsey McWilliams and Dianna Kitt.

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Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by University of Delaware. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

Open defecation-free country became national slogan in 2014

Press Trust of India@ibnlive.com Jan 01, 2015

New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government undertook a significant step in 2014 to make the country free from open defecation under an ambitious plan of around Rs 2 lakh crore.

The year also saw the government deciding to implement the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project for Low Income States (RWSSP-LIS) of Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh with World Bank assistance over a period of six years (from 2013-14 to 2019-20).

The project is aimed at providing improved piped water supply covering approximately 17,400 habitations in 2,150 gram panchayats in 33 districts of the four States.
Open defecation-free country became national slogan in 2014

The Swachh Bharat Mission aims at attaining a 100 per cent open defecation free India by 2019, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

Wielding the broom himself, Mr. Modi launched 'Clean India' campaign on October 2 and was joined by Chief Ministers, lawmakers, prominent personalities from various fields.

The Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) aims at attaining a 100 per cent open defecation free India by 2019, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

The main objective of the programme is to bring about an improvement in the general quality of life in the rural areas, by promoting cleanliness, hygiene and eliminating open defecation and accelerate sanitation coverage in rural areas.

The main activities under the mission are incentives for individual household latrines, construction of community sanitary complexes, solid and liquid waste management projects, information education and communication, capacity building, monitoring and evaluation.

Mr. Modi, while launching the programme, asserted that Swachh Bharat mission is "beyond politics" and inspired by "patriotism". He invoked Gandhi's vision of a "clean and developed" India as he formally kicked off the five-year-long campaign.

The tech-savvy Prime Minister even launched his own version of ALS ice bucket challenge, nominating nine eminent personalities including Sachin Tendulkar, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, industrialist Anil Ambani along with several actors like Salman Khan, Priyanka Chopra and Kamal Hassan to spread awareness on the issue and asked them to continue the chain.

The ministry also launched a nationwide real-time monitoring of use of toilets on Thursday. The monitoring system was unveiled to give a big push to Swachh Bharat Mission.

People across the country will be mobilised to check and verify the use of toilets in the rural areas through mobile phones, tablets or iPads and upload the same in case of any discrepancy on the ministry's website in tune with online citizen monitoring.

Earlier, the monitoring was done only about the construction of toilets, but now the actual use of toilets will be ascertained on a sustained basis.

According to a parliamentary panel report tabled in the Lok Sabha recently, the practice of open defecation in India is due to combination of factors, the most prominent of them being the traditional behavioural pattern and lack of awareness of people about the associated health hazards.

In its report on Drinking Water and Sanitation, the Standing Committee on Rural Development even noted the fact that sanitation is mainly a mindset issue based on socio-cultural issues and habit.

Automated, self cleaning e-Toilets for Tirupati

• By B.venkat Sandeep, www.thehindu.com
• January 4th, 2015

THE HINDU Workers giving finishing touch to e-toilets in front of the Tirupati Railway Station. Photo: K.V. Poornachandra Kumar 

 

Compact steel structures, currently under construction at three major locations of the temple city, seem to have sparked a sense of inquiry among denizens and devotees. Failing to blend in with the surroundings, these futuristic cabins have garnered a stream of curious onlookers, who have interrogated the workers repeatedly about its function. These are nothing but the state-of-the-art, fully automated e-Toilets, soon to be introduced by the Municipal Corporation of Tirupati (MCT).

These toilets, developed by a private company – Eram Scientific, will be set up at three arterial junctions in the city – two cabins each (for men and women) at Central Bus Station and near pilgrim amenities complex – Vishnu Nivasam i.e., opposite to Railway Parcel Office. The third one, comprising of a single cabin, will come up at Urban SP Office near NTR Circle.

Speaking to The Hindu, Municipal Engineer B. Chandrasekhar welcomed the introduction of automated toilets and explained about their functioning. The unit, which costs Rs.5.5 lakh, houses all the information about its usage, in local languages. It has exits and hooters to alert people outside in case of any emergency.

“People can use these toilets by inserting a nominal amount of Rs.2/5, which is yet to be finalised by the Municipal Corporation. Subsequently, the door is opened and occupancy of the cabin is displayed outside. After every five uses, it automatically flushes the floor and has tissues/napkins for the people using it,” he added.

Mr. Chandrasekhar said that the toilets would require less human intervention as inbuilt sensors monitor the situation of the cabins. “The corporation is building tanks at the respective facilities to address water shortage and the company’s service engineer would be training engineers and workers for six months,” he maintained.

The project was a result of an extensive survey conducted in the city and the officials are contemplating to introduce more units based on the feedback of present ones.

Now, a dedicated office to monitor Swachh Abhiyan

Staff Reporter The Hindu, January 3, 2015
 

Vew of the porta-cabin dedicated to the cleanliness campaign inside the Delhi BJP office in New Delhi. Photo: Sushil Kumar Verma

How the city gets cleaned under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet project – Swachh Bharat Abhiyan – will now be monitored from a porta-cabin at the Delhi BJP office on Pt. Pant Marg. The office which has been set up under a chairman will create awareness of the cleanliness drive by involving social wings in the Capital.

According to Satish Garg, chairman of the committee, the cleanliness drive is “not a political but a social movement” which he says is articulated in the pledge that was administered by Mr. Modi when he launched the event on October 2. 

The committee has also prepared a Power-point presentation that will soon be uploaded on the Delhi BJP website which will explain to people how to make this campaign effective. 

Senior leaders and former legislators have also been appointed to monitor the functioning of different civic bodies. Kulwant Rana, former BJP MLA from Rithala, will monitor North Delhi; Manoj Shokeen will oversee activities in East Delhi while Subash Sachdeva will monitor South Delhi. Sources say the BJP is working towards setting right the people’s perception of the party-run civic bodies that have been seen as failing in their duty to clean up the city. This could also involve increasing manpower to clean Delhi, he said.

Times of India Survey on Swatch Bharat project

• timesofindia.indiatimes.com
• January 1st, 2015

NEW DELHI: In a survey ​conducted exclusively for TOI by IPSOS in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune and Ahmedabad, PM Narendra Modi's big cleanliness scheme has caught the nation's imagination.

Of all the Modi government initiatives in its first seven months in office, the Swachh Bharat campaign is most appreciated by the metropolitan middle class.

Asked which initiative they liked most, 56% respondents picked the cleanliness drive, 18% said the foreign policy initiatives were the best thing and 15% chose Jan Dhan Yojana, the financial inclusion scheme.

Narendra Modi participates in the 'Swachh Bharat Campaign' at Assi Ghat in Varanasi. (PTI photo)
The survey polled a little over 1,200 men and women aged 18 and above. The purposive sample was divided equally between men and women and between the cities.

The age groups 18-29, 30-45 and 45-plus were equally represented in the sample as were socio-economic groups SEC A1, A2, B1 and B2. The fieldwork, in the form of face-to-face interviews, was done on December 27 and 28.