Sanitation

To provide enough sanitation provisions for the residents and tourists, the Guwahati Municipal Corporation has now directed the hotels and restaurant owners to allow women and children to use toilets in their premises for free.

“When safai karamcharis actually showed us how manual scavengers carve the hardened sludge in the septic tank and hammer it with their hands, we realised how difficult the environment is for them. That's why this matters."

26-year-old Chitransh is helping make menstrual hygiene accessible to more than 148 women in rural and urban slums in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh through a ‘PadBank’ which is completely free of cost!

Saurabh's startup harnessed the acetic acid content of the citrus fruit waste and developed a bio-toilet cleaning solution.

Linked to no sewer systems or traditional flushing mechanisms, these toilets are modelled to look like any other pit latrines, but have biological agents to work the deed—tiger worms!

Reports say one person has died every five days cleaning sewers and septic tanks across the country. A black mark that must be erased!

"The women were keen to earn a living, but the idea of handling human waste was a major mental block. This is where we took them to some toilet pits which had been lying unused and filled to the brim. We showed them that what lay inside was nothing but a tea powder-like substance. "

Women in these groups have taken it upon themselves to spread the message of sanitation. They speak about the hazards of open defecation and convince households to construct and use toilets.

It was not just the construction of these toilets that made him a hero but his patience and perseverance in persuading the villagers, who seemed to be against it.

Musaharu Ram is an example for those who wait for government intervention.