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The clean-up man
By
Samir Das
 In India, 700 million people and 120
million households have no access to public or private
toilets. Fifty million bucket toilets are cleaned by
half a million "scavengers". This has led to atmospheric
pollution, health hazards and a class of people who
clean up the excreta of others.
To address this
situation, Dr Bindeshwar Pathak, a social worker,
environmentalist and founder of the Sulabh International
Social Service Organization, developed the technology of
a twin-pit, pour-flush toilet known as Sulabh
Shauchalaya (affordable pay toilet), of which a million
have been constructed. This environment-friendly
technology provides on-site disposal with no smell or
soil pollution, and it conserves water.
Through
this development, there has been a massive change in the
attitude and behavior of people toward sanitation.
Indians now readily pay user charges in some 5,500
Sulabh public toilets. Biogas production from human
excreta in 100 public toilets and its various uses, eg
lighting, cooking, etc and the use of effluent as rich
fertilizer are among the hallmark contributions. To the
biogas plant is attached the Sulabh effluent plant,
whereby water discharged is made colorless, odorless and
pathogen-free, fit for discharge into any water body,
promoting a better and healthier environment.
"The winners of UNEP's Global 500 Roll of Honor
are members of a broad environmental movement that is
flourishing around the world. They have taken the path
that most of us hesitate to take for want of time or
caring," said United Nations Environment Program
executive director Klaus Toepfer, before honoring Pathak
in Beirut at the World Environment Day ceremonies this
Thursday.
Here are excerpts from an interview
with Pathak.
Q: This is a major honor of
course; what exactly does it mean for you?
A: Obviously it's a great honor, and one
that encourages people like me and an organization like
Sulabh to work more and work harder. Actually, the
purpose of the award is to recognize some of the efforts
that go on beyond the global environmental issues like
pollution of the ozone layers and pollution of rivers
and felling of trees and so on. Those are global issues
and have been publicized. Sanitation is also a global
issue, but is not known as much.
Q: Will
you tell the layperson what they have given the award to
you for exactly, because the common association with
Sulabh are the public toilets across the cities?
A: Well, one of the biggest problems, not
only in India, but across the Third World, is lack of
basic sanitation facilities. In India alone,
approximately 700 million people defecate outside what
they call their homes. And this is a problem especially
in rural areas. In a village, for example, in the rainy
season, you can imagine the stench and overall pollution
level. In huts, you obviously can't set up proper
toilets, and people don't have that kind of money also.
Ten million people in India use the completely
unhygienic bucket toilets. And what this leads to is
scavenging - which is my biggest area of focus.
Scavengers, people we call janitors, etc, clean these.
That becomes a huge issue, because not only are we
polluting the environment, but also exposing a huge
number of people to other people's excreta.
Q: So, what exactly is your concept -
"twin tub pour flush"?
A: This is an
improvement over the septic tank. Septic tanks use up
more water and are not very eco-friendly because they
don't have a vent pipe for the gases. When the septic
tanks are cleaned, it is massive mess. Scavengers clean
the excreta to start with. And then the collected
excreta is dumped in the grounds where it takes over two
years to become useful as fertilizers. In septic tanks,
the gases are dissolved. What the "twin tub pour flush"
system does is reduce the use of water. It requires just
two liters of water per use. It can be installed in a
village hut. It costs only about Rs500 [less than
US$11], though there are more expensive varieties.
Q: Why do you have different price
ranges?
A: Mainly in the quality of
materials used. Some of the more expensive varieties,
which could cost up to Rs1,500, have better-quality
materials. Also, the more expensive variety, which has
been designed for the urban user actually, doesn't need
to be cleaned for up to 40 years, whereas the Rs500
variety needs to be cleaned every two to three years.
Q: And why two tubs?
A:
One is used, and the other is on standby, to be used
when the first one is full and needs to be cleaned.
Q: That sounds a lot like the EcoSan
[Ecological Sanitation - a similar experiment,
successful in Germany, Scandinavia and parts of Kerala]
concept.
A: No, not at all. That is a dry
latrine. What that does is it separates excreta and
urine. And they keep the excreta in the latrine. I have
always believed that though it has been successful in
some places, including Kerala, it doesn't go with the
Indian culture at all. It can't work in India, even in
rural parts, because it is against our culture. We don't
like handling excreta like that. Also, the WHO [World
Health Organization] has a set of guidelines for a
proper sanitary latrine. And EcoSan doesn't fulfill all
of them. The twin-tub-pour-flush system does.
Q: To go back to the award ... you are
not the first Indian to receive it. Dr Anil Agarwal of
the Center for Science and Environment was a recipient.
A: I know. I have, of course, always been
familiar with his work and the work done by his
organization. But their work is mainly to do with
environmental pollution, rainwater harvesting and so on.
Their work mainly has to do with creating awareness,
though they do a lot of research. My work has to do more
with application. Of course, research has to be there.
Q: But are the Sulabh public toilets
across Indian cities terribly hygienic?
A: The Sulabh complexes across cities are
not unhygienic at all. You won't find any odor there or
any flies, for example. All the necessary facilities are
there, and the public has accepted it totally as their
sanitary solution.
Q: What happens now?
A: Go rural. That's where our focus is.
Scavenging is primarily an urban problem. We need to go
rural and spread awareness. We have our literature in 18
languages, with instructions on how to deal with things.
How to avoid bacteria. How to go about cleaning excreta.
We have provided 46 designs for people to choose from,
and the prices are not high. We plan to have street
plays. All sorts of things. I am sure it will work. Last
year, the WHO figure said 2.4 billion people didn't have
access to hygienic sanitation facilities. This was
spread across Asia, Africa, Latin America ... even parts
of Europe. Awareness is the main thing, and then we need
to provide the solution. This award will also go a long
way in spreading awareness.
(Trans World
Features )
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