GROUND-ZERO: Public Sanitation – Tall promises, poor facilities

May 8, 2017

This is the first of a two-part series on public sanitation and open defecation in Pune.

Sheetal Patil remembers how hygienic her toilet was in her maiden home before she got married and settled with her husband in Vimannagar’s Sanjay Park slum. Although she has a toilet in her house, built under Pune Municipal Corporation’s (PMC) One Home One Toilet scheme for the Swachh Bharat Mission, it isn’t fit for use. “We put in our money and the toilet was built but there is no drainage line for the sewage to pass. There is no point in using it.” Patil along with many other women, men and children have to use the public toilet in the slum that is taken care of by the PMC.

In 2015, PMC along with city-based NGO, Shelter Associates took on the task of building 400 toilets individual toilets in the slums of Pune. Building toilets in each home would ensure that families living within the slum have immediate access to toilets that are safe and clean. This would also mean minimal usage of the public toilet in the slum that is taken care of by the PMC.

“This was a project that we did with the PMC. They told us that they had a drainage line before we built the toilet,” explains Dhanashree Gurav, Project Manager, Shelter Associates. She also adds that the drainage chamber needs regular maintenance so that it doesn’t get choked up. “We formed a committee in the slum to keep a check on people’s grievances regarding this. But, we don’t keep regular contact with them.”

Running ahead of other cities in the Swachh Bharat race, the PMC compiled the Public Toilet Policy Document that gives the standard framework for public toilets in the city. The document lays out specifics of how every community toilet, public toilet and public urinal has to be constructed and maintained. According to the document’s mandatory design elements, every toilet is to have optimal lighting, individual dustbins and doors in male and female bathrooms, health faucets or tap and mug system and differently-abled or elderly friendly accessories like western-style or Indian-style commodes with grab bars.

Urinal in women’s toilet, Sanjay Park slum

In the Sanjay Park slum, entering the women’s toilet, a fresh piece of excreta, atop the urinal, greets you along with a swarm of flies hovering over it. There are no faucets or taps in either of the bathrooms and the urinals reek of human waste. There are no individual dustbins in the bathrooms except for a large dustbin filled with menstrual waste and sanitary napkins which have been there for close to a month. “The cleaning attendants from PMC come every day in the morning but all they do is splash water and go. We have complained several times to our ward officer but it is pointless. They don’t clean the urinals regularly or empty the dustbin. They wait for the dustbin to be overfilled and then only take it out. At night, we have to take a torch to go to the bathroom because the light isn’t sufficient,” says Archana Gaikwad, a resident of the slum since 30 years.

In the dingy walls tainted with paan stains, neither of the toilets in the men’s bathroom have an attached door. Apart from natural light during the day, there is just one bulb to make do with at night.

A single source of light in the men’s toilet, Sanjay Park slum

“There is lack of public awareness on sanitation. The residents have choked the drainage pipe themselves. The manhole is only cleaned when there is a complaint. We have conducted several workshops in the slum regarding this. Earlier, there was a lot of open defecation of the whole stretch of the slum. Now that has at least stopped. We will look into the bathrooms for repairs and fix up the drainage line. The residents need to have a sense of responsibility too,” states Vasant Patil, Assistant Municipal Commissioner, Nagar Road Ward Office.

The residents in this slum dread the monsoon season as along with much-needed showers, it brings unwanted diseases and also floods the slum with sewage, “We all have to collect our own waste during the monsoons. It is normal for us. ‘Swachh Bharat’ bol ke ‘Ganda Bharat’ kar ke chale gaye!” jokes Gaikwad.

Photographs: Sanket Wankhade for Pune365