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Changing attitudes is just as important as building toilets if Modi is to achieve his 2019 goal of making India clean
By Magdalena Mis
LONDON, Oct 2 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - India may have set a record in space with its recent Mars mission, but it also remains the world leader in a distinctly less glamorous category: almost 600 million of its people still defecate in the open - more than in any other nation.
It's not just about all the poo that's lying out there.
Lack of adequate sanitation costs the economy an estimated $54 billion a year, and the practice puts people at risk from cholera, diarrhoea, dysentery, hepatitis A and typhoid - not to mention the women and girls who risk violence, or even death, at the hands of vicious men when they leave home to defecate in the open.
India has launched various campaigns over the decades to improve its people's access to sanitation, but its progress has been less than impressive, and half the population still has no access to a proper toilet.
Still, a wind of change does seem to be blowing in India, even if not for the first time.
When independence leader Mahatma Gandhi said in 1925 that "sanitation is more important than independence", he could not foresee that almost 90 years later, the prime minister would use his birthday, October 2, to launch a "Clean India" campaign and tell top officials to clean their ministries, including the toilets.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's initiative - yet another publicity stunt, his critics say - is part of his pledge to 'clean India' by 2019, the 150th anniversary of Gandhi's birth, and that includes providing a toilet for every household.
However, building the toilets is only part of Modi's problem. India already has almost 40 million "dead toilets" that either exist only on paper or have been built but are used for storage or even as temples.
"Making toilets is easy, the challenge is getting people to use them," Neeraj Jain, chief executive of the charity Water Aid India, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
According to Jain, Modi's call for every citizen to devote two hours a week to civic cleanliness is part of a process in which, starting at the top by asking his own officials to lead by example, the prime minister hopes to get everyone involved in cleaning up the country.
"(Modi) is not forcing people to do this, he's trying to get people to change their behaviour and to create role models," said Jain. "It's a step in the right direction."
Hopefully Modi's desire to make India clean in just five years will not remain just another ambitious politician's pledge. At the end of the day the prime minister will want to show he can fulfil his promises if he wants to be re-elected.
As India's next general election will coincide with Modi's 2019 deadline for providing a toilet for every household, his own voters may prove the best incentive for him to keep his promise and make India famous not for its lack of sanitation, but for a world record in improvement. (Reporting By Magdalena Mis; editing by Tim Pearce)
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