Society, Culture, Religion and History

Hailstorm destroys crop in Maharashtra

Women patiently wait for the sun to go down, to squat in open fields. Young children do so unabashedly on the roads under the open skies. Well into our 67th year of independence, the sanitation situation hasn't changed much in villages and towns across the nation.

Sikkim only state in the country with 100% sanitation

UNICEF's digital media campaign against open defecation

UNICEF launches a three-month long campaign 'Take Poo to the Loo' to raise awareness against defecation in open among the youth.

Sanitation is a familiar term but is often misunderstood to mean the building and using of toilets but this isn’t true. It covers a whole range of thought and action both pre and post latrine use, which includes cleanliness, personal hygiene and the safe disposal of the urine and faeces.

The failure to heed to one’s conscience results in the sense of shame, because one feels one’s personal worth has been lessened. The present situation in country where there are more than many examples where act of people are groups can severely traumatize people and victimize people.

Subsidy proponents believe that the poor need economic incentives while shaming proponents contend that to bring out lasting behavioural change, intrinsic motivation is required; people are more likely to use and value things they have had to pay for.

The role of sanitation in girl child education - A documentary film by HEEALS

HEEALS is a vibrant civil society organization that aims to safeguard health, environment, education and livelihood to promote sustainable development of society. Through the medium of documentary film and art it is trying to create awareness among the masses about girl child education, menstrual hygiene, sanitation and safe drinking water and attempting to relate how girl child education directly suffers due to bad sanitation facilities, unsafe drinking water and lack of knowledge to obtain the same.

The Himalayas are inhabited by 40 million people, most of whom are dependent on agriculture and animal husbandry. The prevalent water scarcity also means a lack of water for sanitation. In this case, both open defecation and conventional sewerage pose a health risk. Conventional toilets not only consume a lot of water, but the effluent also pollutes groundwater.

Waterless urinals (WLU) save water, energy and use urine as resource ( Image courtesy: R Sakthivel)