India's sanitation summit overshadows problems that persist
244 views · Published 6 October 2018 · 3:40 · Indexed 25 September 2026
Channel: AP Archive · 2018 · News & Politics
(1 Oct 2018) In Taimoor Nagar, a slum just outside one of the New Delhi's poshest neighbourhoods, hundreds of people rely on a single public toilet, underscoring the challenges that remain for India's urban poor. India's population of 1.3 billion constituted 60 percent of the world's open defecation in 2014, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power, dropping to 20 percent by 2018. A summit on Tuesday where United Nations is celebrating the government programme is overshadowed by the struggles with open defecation that remain in the heart of India's capital. The 20 billion US dollar programme concludes in 2019, timed to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi's birth. But, aside from a recently hung Swachh Bharat banner at the entrance to the portable toilet and wash basins in Taimoor Nagar, residents have seen little evidence of the programme's gains. Sometimes the toilet is too dark, too dirty or too expensive - it costs 5 rupees or 7 cents per person - for Sapna, 31, a maid who goes by only her first name, and her husband and four children to use. "Going to the bathroom is a huge problem for us. We have to pay for it and I have four children.," Sapna said. Toilet fees and medicine eat into her family's 13,000-rupee (180 US dollars) monthly income. Henrietta Fore, executive director of UNICEF, who was part of the summit in New Delhi, said technologies and skilled workers, along with community involvement, is required to effectively create a clean environment in urban and rural areas. However, in most unauthorized colonies in New Delhi most people don't even have bathrooms in their homes, creating congested, unsanitary conditions, especially for women. Rahima Begum says women in her neighborhood "keep running from one place to another," in search of a safe place to do their business. Especially at night, when they have to rely on people like Rajaram Kamat, 60, a samosa vendor whose household is among just one of the few to have a toilet. In four years, half-a-billion people have stopped openly defecating in India, in part due to the 450,000 community "motivators" who have encouraged people to use the nearly 84 million toilets that have been built in rural areas. Fore says the poorest neigborhoods are the most unsanitary and "need an example like India where Prime Minister Modi has been clear, strong, he has put funding behind it, and they've moved people," to drastically change the country's environment. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/ You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/b273e48639721623d2155e786b3985e4
