Revisiting Bhubaneswar’s Sites

The drastically reduced budget for the Community Toilets in Bhubaneswar will only allow us to build only 26 of the originally planned 60 facilities. This meant that the team had to decide which communities would receive a facility and which would be forced to keep their fingers-crossed in hopes that sometime in the future their needs will be met. Doing so was no small task, and one that required the participation of virtually all those working on the initiative. Further complicating matters was the two-week deadline mandated by the government to complete the work.

The first step in this process was visiting all proposed sites to identify any encroachment issues. As the land was identified and allocated to the project nearly 2 years ago, there was serious concern that many of the sites would no longer be open and available for construction. In fact, some members of the Land Department at the BMC guessed that most, if not all, sites would have encroachment issues prior to commencing with the visits. Needless to say, such a suggestion made for a very anxious mood amongst the partners.

It took every bit of the two weeks in order to complete the site visits due to prior obligations by the partners at the BMC on other projects. The Amins at the Land Department would spend the entire day working on a drainage project in Bhubaneswar, and then accompany the other project team members for Sammaan site visits each evening. The critical nature of the work, along with the mandated deadline, also led to visits being conducted on Saturday and Sunday to ensure all were completed on time.

The constraints on the time the Amins could dedicate to this work was a cause for concern for the project team, so an independent evaluation of the sites also took place simultaneously, with a few team members photographing every site in case such evidence was needed to verify if a site was encroached or not. This proved to be a redundant exercise, though, as we were able to finish the work alongside the Amins in time. That said, it speaks volumes to the level of commitment the team has in ensuring every aspect of work is completed in as rigorous and timely a manner as possible.

Thankfully, these fears proved largely unfounded as each day progressed and more sites were visited. There were encroachment issues in some places, ranging from minor instances in which community members had appropriated some of a plot for their own personal uses (ironically, and telling, enough, we found makeshift toilets on a few sites) to major issues such as a concrete home being built on one of the sites. All told, of the 60 “treatment sites” (i.e., plots of land for Sammaan facilities to be constructed on), less than 20% had issues serious enough to prevent inclusion in the initial round of tendering. This figure may sound high, but given the expectations before starting this exercise, the team was very relieved that it was this low.

This was a much-needed bit of good news coming off of the budget cut that necessitated this unplanned for, but vitally important, activity. Unfortunately, this sense of relief was tempered by the fact that more than half of the communities we visited would not receive facilities due to a lack of funding, at least for the near future. This was the first time that many of us had visited the actual communities we plan on building in. Due to the research component of Sammaan, we’ve limited our basti visits to those outside the project. It was incredibly difficult to spend each and every day for two weeks engaging with community members knowing full well that we would be letting down more than half of them, especially considering the conditions that many of these communities are forced to endure. As we’ve said before though, and as many of us still believe, this shortfall of funding is only temporary and there is still optimism, and expectation, that the remaining facilities will be built in due time. It’s just that such thoughts are of little consolation when one sees the harsh realities of daily life in most of these bastis, where few if any toilet facilities were seen.