India’s Sanitation Challenges & Project Sammaan
The sanitation in India is in a critical state with sanitation habits varying based on socio-cultural practices. In a country with 35% of the population illiterate, effective communication of public health-related issues, like sanitation, is a big challenge. In spite of mega ventures like Central Rural Sanitation Programme (CRSP) and the Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC, also known as the Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan), 60% of the population does not have a proper structure for defecation and 90% of children’s feces is not properly managed, 23 million children below the age of 14 in urban India are at risk from poor sanitation, and 8 million children in urban areas are at risk from poor water supply leading to diarrheal disease.
Despite these programs, around 60% percent of the population remains without access to adequate sanitation. The vast majority of this unreached population is poor, rural inhabitants. By a simple estimate, India needs to ensure an additional 106 million people have access to toilets to meet the MDG target. Approximately one million people, most of them children, die due to sanitation-related diseases every year. Additionally, shame, indignity, and nuisance are inflicted upon millions of its’ people due to inadequate sanitation.
The biggest challenge for addressing the sanitation situation in India is that it is not enough to have only a top-down approach; the entire process, from planning to implementation, needs to be inclusive with designated and dedicated spaces for community engagement. This will ensure that local needs are taken into consideration while meeting the national sanitation needs of the people.
Also important are well-defined institutional roles and mechanisms, appropriate plans for management of funds, and synergies and coordination between the multiple departments to deal with all the aspects of sanitation. It would also support the cause of improving sanitation, if the authorities and powers-that-be are made “pro-people” through various capacity building processes. An overhaul of the entire system of governance with an emphasis on making it accountability will also improve the sanitation situation in the country.
It is essential to build capacities through interactive training sessions. Simultaneously, health functionaries also need to be oriented to adjust to a new environment and play their effective roles. Thus, improvement in sanitation requires newer strategies and targeted interventions with follow-up evaluation. To achieve the goals on environmental sustainability set by MDGs, by 2015, Project Sammaan, aims to address the issues relating to poor sanitation and open defecation in the under-privileged settlements and among the general public in the twin cities of Bhubaneswar and Cuttack. The future and sustainability exclusively depends not only on community mobilisation and sensitisation of the stakeholders, but also positive and encouraging response from the various systems of governance.
The biggest challenge for the Project Sammaan and CFAR will be to stimulate and sustain demand for sanitation blocks with user’s fee. It will be difficult involving the communities’ time and support at existing sanitation blocks supported by BMC and CMC that are currently used for free. Time constraint to mobilise the community for sustaining the endeavour is another challenge as any delays in project execution will only further add to concerns.