South Central Railway to provide bio-toilets on more trains

The South Central Railway (SCR) plans to procure 200 more eco-friendly bio-toilets to provide the facility on more trains in the next few months.

The decision was taken after successful trial of 48 bio-toilets fitted to the 17 coaches being run on Hyderabad-Mumbai Hussain Sagar Express and Kacheguda-Bangalore Express.

Bio-toilets were developed jointly by Railway Research and Standard Organisation (RDSO) and Defence Research Development Establishment (DRDE) for use in Indian Railways and are currently under trial in many of the zonal railways.

SCR, which has its headquarters here, took a lead in the trial and provided the facility in two trains.

The conventional toilets in the trains, by allowing human waste to fall on the tracks, cause unhygienic conditions and corrosion to track and coach fittings endangering the safety. Passengers use toilets while trains are at platforms and the track get scattered with human excreta creating unpleasant situation for passengers on the platforms, said a statement from SCR on Friday.

With the advent of bio-toilets, the railways have found an answer to the vexatious problem.

The bio-toilet, which has six compartments, uses inoculums (bacteria) to decompose the waste. The waste from commode enters in to the bio-tank, (where the inoculums are stored), gets decomposed by the bacteria and next enters a chlorine. The output will be just water and gas.

The railways have appealed to passengers not to dump plastic bottles, carry bags, cups, napkins and other material in bio-toilets as they get chocked and go out of order.