Carlin Carr, Mumbai Community Manager
At a recent sanitation roundtable discussion at the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), a public policy think tank in Mumbai, Chairman Sudheendra Kulkarni said that Mahatma Gandhi believed sanitation was more important than political independence. In 2010, the UN declared access to sanitation a human right. Despite the increased emphasis, says Dhaval Desai, a senior researcher at ORF, the two are rarely linked. “If one agrees that there is a connect between lack of access to clean and hygienic sanitation and global statistics on poverty, malnutrition, infant mortality, maternal health, diseases, education, and gender, then it is impossible to deny sanitation as an intrinsic human rights issue.” Desai, who specializes in water and sanitation issues, discussed with us the importance of this human rights issue and some promising ways forward.
What is the current situation in Mumbai?
The current situation in Mumbai is as bad as it is in the rest of India. Media reports quoting Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) data have shown recently that Mumbai has a provision of 10,381 public toilet facilities for its total population of nearly 13 million. Thus, against the WHO norms of availability of one toilet seat per 50 people, Mumbai has one toilet seat per 1,200 people. The situation is worse when you look at availability of public conveniences for women. Only 3,181 toilet seats of the total are for women, giving a ratio of one toilet seat per 1,800 women.
Can you paint us a picture of what a typical slum dweller deals with each day in this regard?
The situation is not as bad for men as it is for women and young girls. With a poor ratio of toilet seats to population, it is common to find long queues of men and women — with dabbas (water cans) in their hands, since many toilets do not have any running water — outside community toilet blocks, waiting for their turn. Many have to walk long distances from their homes to reach the toilet block.
But this is only in slums where the toilets are maintained well and are usable. The condition of many community toilets is so pathetic that they are simply unusable. It is in such slums where open defecation is actually the preferred option. But this is also where the women and young girls become most vulnerable and are forced to venture out for their daily ablutions, looking for secluded spots in the neighbourhood under the cover of darkness. For the children, on the other hand, defecating in the open is an extremely common phenomenon, just a ‘way of life’.
You recently held a roundtable discussion on sanitation at ORF Mumbai and came to a consensus that every home should have a toilet rather than community toilets. Why this is the best option and is it feasible?
Access to toilets inside slum homes is the best and possibly the easiest and most scalable of options. There are examples of slum pockets across Mumbai where toilets do exist inside homes, and each of these slums tells an inspiring story of how toilets have actually brought about a silent social revolution in the lives of the residents. All of these toilets are as well-maintained as one can find in any good corporate office or an affluent home. The only difference is that these toilets and bathrooms do not have ‘designer’ fittings and toiletries.
Slum improvement programs undertaken by organizations like Shelter Associates, a Pune-based NGO, on behalf of the State Government in the towns of Sangli and Miraj have also focused on provision of toilets inside homes as being the easiest and most feasible option.
Could you tell us about one or two interesting sanitation initiatives in Mumbai?
The Tulshetpada slum in Bhandup, a northern suburb of Mumbai, has witnessed a silent social revolution thanks to provision of toilets inside homes, by far the most striking sanitation initiative in the city. The other amazing success story is of the community toilet run by a community-based organization called Triratna Prerana Mandal (TPM) in the western Mumbai suburb of Santacruz. TPM took over the management of the toilet in 2001 under the MCGM’s Slum Sanitation Program, but has taken this work to high levels of social transformation. They run a self-help group for women, offer vocational training to the youth of the slum, run computer training classes on the terrace of the toilet, which also has a community kitchen preparing midday meals for 3,000 school children. The toilet gets all its water from a rainwater harvesting system and is powered 100 percent by solar energy. TPM’s community toilet is a glorious example of a toilet’s power of transformation. If only Mumbai can have hundreds more Tulshetpadas and TPMs.
Photo credit: CDC Foundation