might think that this is an important
challenge to tackle but how many of you
can really tell me why is it so
important as a researcher one of the
things that drives me is this question
of why and how do I address it so what
I’m going to talk to you about today is
derived from my work at une merit and
finn india why sanitation important
access to sanitation hasn’t recognized
as a basic human right which means that
people have the right to have access to
a toilet in order to relieve themselves
but sanitation is important for more
reasons than just being a human right
inadequate sanitation has a significant
impact on health it’s linked to
diarrheal disease the spread of
vector-borne diseases like malaria
typhoid and cholera and other parasitic
diseases in 2011 UNICEF estimated that
around seven hundred and sixty thousand
children under the age of five are dying
every day due to diarrheal disease India
accounted for 24 percent of those deaths
which means one hundred and eighty two
thousand four hundred children under the
age of five are dying every day ninety
percent of these deaths are directly
linked to contaminated water lack of
according to the World Bank the
estimated cost of inadequate sanitation
to India is 54 billion dollars a year so
now you might understand slightly why
sanitation is so important but sitting
here you might think you know what
still doesn’t affect me let me paint you
a little picture you’re standing on
marine drive in the monsoons and the
waves are splashing up at you and you’re
enjoying yourselves seems like a great
escape from the heat that’s outside let
me enhance that picture for you little
bit mixed in the waves a tiny particles
of fecal matter and what is that
essentially it’s
other people’s party so scientist is
important when we think of when we think
of sanitation in our homes we think of a
bathroom but from our homes in the
bathrooms all that fecal matter or
sewage is taken to seven different
treatment plants around Mumbai where
they are treated in the light our
tendency urban India generates
approximately 63 thousand million litres
of sewage a day where we have the
treatment capacity of only about 23,000
so 63 percent of our sewage is not
treated or not treated effectively
before it is let out into water bodies
like rivers lakes and seas this affects
not only our lives but also the lives of
all the organisms that live there in
2015 the United Nations adopted a new
agenda for development and shined in the
sustainable development goals these 17
goals are a road map to where our world
can be in 2030 sanitation is an
important aspect of these goals most
directly linked to goal number 6 which
is access to water and sanitation
there is also linked to a number of
these number of other goals like poverty
hunger health education gender
inequality clean energy sustainable
cities and life under water so too safe
to say that a push towards sanitation is
going to be a push towards a number of
these goals in 2015 564 million people
lack access to basic sanitation
facilities in India and defecated in the
open this means at about a hundred
thousand tons of poop ended up in the
open every day how much is one hundred
thousand tons it seems like a big number
it’s enough to fill up Wembley Stadium
completely every day this much poop
so it’s safe to say that it’s a genuine
health problem so in order to achieve
SDG six we must move towards eliminating
open defecation but what I’ve come to
realize in my travels around India and
my work in rural India is that it’s not
as simple as just building toilets
I’ve often gone to villages where I see
toilets and houses and people are still
defecating in the open these toilets are
being used for as chicken coops or as
storage units or utility closets and
when I ask people you know you have a
toilet
why are you defecating in the open the
most common response I have gotten is
it’s too congested in there you know we
like the open breeze when we are pooping
so people need to be educated as to why
they must use a toilet and they also we
need to ensure that we with people take
responsibility and ownership of these
toilets in order to ensure that they are
being used so when we think of a toilet
we in the cities just think of a commode
but everywhere else where there is no
sewage system it’s not so simple the
toilets also need to be able to process
the fecal matter so predominantly there
are three types of toilets that are
being built around India the first looks
something like this it’s a pit latrine
so it’s a six-foot lined pit where
people defecate and the fecal matter
collects over time the liquid components
leach out of this pit and the solid
components turn into compost now if this
pit is not built correctly or if it’s
built say too close to a water body or
too close to the groundwater table this
leaching liquid components are going to
get into the water and contaminate it so
then all the water that we are going to
be drinking it’s going to have little
pieces of poop in it the second type of
toilet is called a septic tank here
there’s a chamber that processes the
fecal matter before it’s left out but
what remains in this chamber something
called fecal sludge we need to ensure
this thing is with the fecal sludge
needs to be taken out periodically and
disposed of safely if the chamber is not
built correctly when it’s a month when
it’s monsoon season and there’s heavy
rains rainwater can enter this chamber
causing it to overflow and contaminating
all the soil around it the third type of
toilet that is being built is not very
common but it’s built it’s called an eco
sign it’s called a urine diversion
toilet here it requires a significant
change in behavior among the users there
are separate places to urinate and
separate places to defecate and no water
is used in this model the fecal matter
devoid of any water or urine compost
within nine months and then can be taken
out and used as a fertilizer for crops
the urine and waste water can then be
India is a country of vast and varying
geographies which means a
one-size-fits-all model does not always
work for sanitation in India we need to
ensure that the toilets that we are
building are non-contaminated which
means that they’re not acting as points
of contamination for our water bodies
and our soil we don’t solve the problem
of open defecation today only to create
a much bigger problem of contaminated
groundwater and soil in the
we in the cities of access to sanitation
for a long time so you know we may think
that you know we’re going we’re going
the right way but that’s not really true
because we think of sanitation with the
limited view of having only access to a
toilet we’re not in the best shape
either in February this year the largest
leak in Bangalore City caught fire the
fire burned for 12 hours in the middle
of a leak that covered 890 acres
scientists from Indian Institute of
Science estimated around 500 million
litres of sewage untreated sewage is
dumped into the sleep every day which
caused me Ian to build up which then
caught fire if we continue on this path
towards development without any concern
for the environment we are going to be
heading towards a severe water crisis
and the state of our villages will not
be very different from that of our
cities where we produce more waste than
we can manage contaminated water sources
and have severe health problems the
scenes that are depicted in Mad Max are
actually not so far from a reality that
we are heading towards so we need to
ensure and find new ways to conserve
water but we also need to find and
ensure that the sources that we do have
now sanitation therefore is very rightly
put on the top of the development agenda
for India 9,000 crores were lauded to
the swachh bharat mission in last year’s
budget a significant portion of that was
to build toilets but building toilets is
not is not so simple as I’ve just
explained to you these toilets need to
be you need to make sure the tourists
are being built and non contaminating we
also have excellent Masons in our
country by building toilets is a new
exercise for them so district level
training workshops may be set up to
ensure that these Mason’s are not
building the wrong kinds of toilets
in the most in one of our most recent
studies we found that 45% of the toilets
that were being built were abandoned in
two years because they were in desperate
need for repair
so while we are working towards
providing access to those 564 million
people in India that did not have it we
would also ensure that the access that
we are providing them is sustained and
so repair and maintenance agencies need
to be set up now to deal with these
problems as they occur finally while
talking about sustainability we need to
this watch for admission also needs to
take into account the city’s sewage and
fecal sludge now companies are very very
dedicated towards achieving this goal
yeah two thousand crores was spent since
2014 as part of corporate social
responsibility programs to just build
toilets but you know building toilets
it’s just it’s not enough more time and
energy needs to be spent in educating
people on why they must use them because
without that building toilets is a
futile exercise this small recalibration
into looking at CSR programs will take
us forward leaps and bounds in achieving
this goal these focus areas are not just
you know points to bond it on for
companies and policy makers but it’s
also opportunities opportunities for
social entrepreneurs who are working
towards achieving development in India
and sustainable development in India
over the last few years I’ve had the
immense pleasure of working with some
fantastic social entrepreneurs who are
addressing different aspects of this
goal from creating effective
microorganisms that can speed up the
composting process in the toilet
chambers to creating finer interactive
games that might make learning but why
so Mike Michael is this we don’t talk
about sanitation not among ourselves not
to anybody it seems like a taboo subject
to us so all of you need to start
talking more about your and more
about poop sanitation is a grand
challenge and sewer needs to be tackled
from multiple perspectives when
different stakeholders get together and
talk and initiate a dialogue we’ll be
able to create long-term solutions for
the sustainable goals so do not flush
and forget think about what happens to
your poop after the toilet it might seem
like something y’all don’t want to do
but it is important that you all do so
because this is important not only for
our cities but also for our villages
thank you very much [Applause]