THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Last week Siluvamma, a poor fisherwoman was fatally attacked by around 50 stray dogs as she came out of the house to relieve herself near Pulluvila coastal village on the outskirts of Thiruvananthapuram. Besides sending shock waves across the state and even triggering a debate on strays, the tragic incident brought to the fore the vulnerability of families without toilets. Her terrible death has also raised the need for providing toilets to all households which in fact is the objective of Open Defecation Free (ODF) project. While the Cabinet on Thursday decided to invite Prime Minister Narendra Modi to declare Kerala as the first ODF state among the large states on November 1, reports suggest that the work on the ground has not even crossed the half way mark.
Of the target of 1.9 lakh toilets, a little over 34,000 toilets have already been completed and work on over 90,000 is currently going on. So far only a handful of grama panchayats have declared themselves as ODF civic bodies. But there is still a long way to go. Officials of Suchitwa Mission, the nodal agency for the project, is confident of meeting the November 1 deadline as it expects the work to start on war footing after Onam festival. They say more than 97 per cent of households in the state already have toilets. The quick baseline survey conducted by the agency had revealed that only 2 lakh households have to be covered with toilet facility in rural areas.
In urban areas the number of households which do not have toilet comes to 32,000. Besides, in urban areas there are 60,000 insanitary latrines to be converted to sanitary latrines also. Only rural Kerala is being declared ODF on November 1. Urban areas will become ODF on March 31, 2017. The biggest challenge is to cover the coastal population with toilet facility. With the average population density of coastal areas being 2022/sq km compared to the state average of 590/sq km, the authorities are grappling to find a feasible solution. Experts say eco san toilets are the most viable option in these areas. Since open defecation is contaminating drinking water sources leading to gastrointestinal diseases, the focus is to provide feasible toilet facilities to the population at the earliest.
Despite being a viable technology, eco san toilets are yet to implemented on a largescale in coastal areas. At many places along side compost toilets, people are also constructing flush toilets. According to rough estimates, the entire coastal belt has about only 2,000 dry pit toilets which is too less. “For bigger colonies like the ones coming under Rajiv Awas Yojana there is a provision for mini sewage treatment plant. Centralised sewage plants for coastal areas are not feasible. Another option is the eco san toilets which are considered to be very good option for coastal areas. Very little water is required for eco san toilets. In some areas the pay and use community toilets have also worked effectively,” said Sajan P.B of Costford.
As part of the ODF project, community toilets are also being planned in coastal areas. The idea is to have community toilets comprising three flush toilets, one eco san and a bathroom. These toilets will be located within 50 meters of the households in that area. Since toilets in every house hold may not be feasible in entire coastal stretch, the community toilets are considered most viable for declaring the area ODF. Another critical sector is the tribal area. For instance in Attapady nearly 5,000 toilets are required to declare that area ODF. Suchitwa Mission and Costford are working together to build toilets made of bamboo and mud in these areas.
The local tribal people will be given special training for making these toilets from September 6 to 10. Besides making the area ODF, the project will also provide income generating activities for tribals. COSTFORD experts say each toilet is estimated to cost Rs 15,000. However, the cost will come down significantly since the material will be collected locally and they would also be cutting bamboo saving the labour cost. Five pre-fabrication units have been set up in that area to train the local people. The types of latrine facilities in Kerala as per 2011 census are; 66.68 per cent water closet, 28.30 pit latrine, 0.22 other latrine and 4.80 per cent no latrine. Clearly, Kerala which boasts of high human development indicators will have to bring down "no latrine" percentage to zero level for becoming an ODF state in true sense.
