‘Look, our village has toilets now’

Sehore district of Madhya Pradesh was declared open defecation-free in March 2017. Jahangirpura village in Sehore, with the help of Bhopal-based development support organisation Samarthan, was awarded the Nirmal Gram Puraskar (clean village prize); the villagers had gradually worked towards completely changing the way their village was perceived since 2012 to achieve this honour.

Shanti, 59, remembers: “When I was younger, it was impossible to walk on the main road leading to the village as both sides were used for defecation. Visitors would not come into our village; it was a terrible image that people had of our village.”

Rani, another resident, captures the plight of women after giving birth to a child. “Sometimes, it would take up to half an hour to get them outside the house and then back!” With shrinking space, going to nearby fields was not an option. Landowners would pelt women and children with stones to push them further away from their lands.

Rajendra Lodi, 33, Panchayat Gram Rojgar Sahayak , remembers beginning work in his village, Jahangirpura, in November 2012. “There were only 5-7 toilets for a population of 2,756, and even those were broken and thus not used. First I got a toilet made in my house, but it was not being used. Then I got the soak pit constructed. Only then was I able to get family members to use it. This enabled me to encourage people to build their own toilets,” says Rajendra, who has a Master’s in Public Administration.

Yellow gang at work

The formation of the ‘Yellow Gang’ by Samarthan, with team members dressed in yellow sarees and T-shirts to create awareness, made a difference. From 5 am, the gang would go around singing bhajans and persuade people not to defecate in the open. The UpaSarpanchh , Vimal Lodhi, says it was but natural that people would abuse them, but with Samarthan’s intervention, they were able to rally people together. The village, largely comprising agricultural labourers and no landowners, understood the importance of toilets and co-related it to dignity. Gradually, each family opted to construct toilets based on their needs and budget. The village, thus, has a variety of toilets — from the basic stand-alone structure to some with attached bathrooms, all totalling about 340.

Shanti remembers working as a daily labourer for ₹5 when she was much younger. “I always used to accompany my daughters, Kalawati, Lalita and Usha, to the field.” Now widowed and with a breathing problem, Shanti sought out the panchayat secretary to share her concern: she just could not go to the fields any more.

Shanti was put in touch with Shobha Lodi, a Samarthan field worker, who works with 350 households in the two villages of Jahangirpura and Nayapura. With MGNREGA convergence under the Swachh Bharat mission, Shanti got the toilet made at ₹9,900, with the family contributing the labour.

Jamuna Bai, who lives a few houses away from Shanti, says since the villagers built their own toilets there have been fewer instances of fever and other illnesses. She recalls always eating less; “Any day that I had a full meal meant I would have to look to go out,” she says, adding with a smile, “If you have to go to the toilet, you need to go; you can’t avoid or postpone it!”

Jamuna Bai’s daughter-in-law, Pinky, comes from a village near Dewas, a large industrial town. Her parents’ home did not have a toilet. Her husband, Om Prakash, says he is relieved that both his mother and wife do not have to go out. “I know Pinky prefers to stay here and is now hesitant to visit her parents’ home.’’ Says Pinky, “We have time for our household chores without worrying because we have access to the toilet whenever we need it.”

Shobha Lodi, 32, talks about her work with Samarthan — motivating people to get toilets constructed and use them — as a way of contributing to the betterment of society.

While Sehore remains an outstanding example of Government initiatives coming to fruition with the support of local organisations, Samarthan’s Programme Director Shrdha Kumar speaks about their ‘Dekh Parakh Report’, submitted to the National Foundation of India on the verification of portal data with beneficiaries. Conducted in 10 districts in Madhya Pradesh, while reviewing the Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) work on eligibility verification, construction quality and usage, the report found there were at least 10 per cent households that did not figure anywhere in the database, eligible or ineligible.

There was a large mismatch bwtween the portal and the actual status. These households, as found during the study, were normally grouped in a hamlet comprising those from marginalised communities and located at a distance from the core habitation of the village.

Some of the key findings of the study were that 60 per cent of panchayats had 20 households completely left out, four to five households had conflicting status on the Swachh Madhya Pradesh portal, 42 per cent of ineligible households with ‘having toilet status’ did not have a functional toilet, more than 50 per cent toilets were being used (completely, partially) and 40 per cent of the newly constructed toilets, with complete funds disbursement, were still incomplete.

The construction was found to be of poor quality, particularly where panchayats had appointed contractors or the panchayat itself constructed the toilets on behalf of beneficiaries. Rajendra Lodhi in Sehore talks about ground realities: “I had to get the work done — sand, brick, cement seats. We had to manage without increasing the cost. And, finally, the toilet should not smell,” he says, explaining the challenges at work.

Jeet Parmar, who oversees SBM work for Samarthan, makes the point about the quality of the toilets in the 10 villages that Samarthan has supported. “When NGOs support the roll-out of such large programmes, with the help of active women self-help group leadership, they monitor how much is being done and that ensures quality of construction of the toilets. Where beneficiaries are not aware, they have had to redo Government constructed toilets,” he explains.

Other issues that the study looked into included unwarranted administrative pressure, a nexus between the beneficiary and panchayat to pocket the incentive amount, and misleading geo-tagging. Shrdha, while underscoring that the study was representative of parts of Madhya Pradesh, says more work is needed with panchayats and officials to cover this gap.

The clean village of Sehore is proof that Madhya Pradesh is inching closer to eliminating open defection, and that communities and panchayats have a major role to play in this effort.

The writer, based out of Lucknow currently, has been supporting large public health programmes in India such as polio eradication and family planning