Public, private stakeholders join hands to battle defecation demon

A broad coalition has been launched to bring together public and private stakeholders in the sanitation space, to make the country free of open defecation.

The India Sanitation Coalition, launched by drinking water and sanitation minister Chaudhary Birender Singh, includes 51 organisations and several individual experts.

The initiative, launched under the aegis of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), will comprise four task forces with cross-sector representation having specific goals and representing all coalition members.

"Corporate contributions to the sanitation sector can yield rich dividends for them in terms of a healthier workforce besides generating goodwill for them and demand for their products," said Birender Singh. He added that his ministry has issued guidelines to facilitate the participation of companies in sanitation works and states have been allowed flexibility to use these as a base for developing their own procedure to attract and utilise corporate social responsibility funds.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had set 2019 as the deadline for the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin), which aims to attain an "open-defecation-free India" primarily by constructing toilets in all rural households.

The baseline survey on sanitation carried out in 2013 has shown that out of 180 million rural households, 110 million do not have access to toilets. Although a large number of toilets have been constructed, 18 million among these have been reported to be defunct.