NIRMAL BHARAT ABHIYAN AND ITS CONTRADICTIONS

It is an indisputable fact that individual health and hygiene is largely dependent on the availability of safe drinking water and sanitation. Since 1999, the Government of India has been investing its revenue on achieving these objectives in rural India where the hygiene and sanitation is awfully poor. The Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC) was renamed as Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan (NBA) to accelerate sanitation coverage in the rural areas. What is the ground reality? Does it work? Can we neglect its contradictions?

                      

The residues of the toilets built as part of Total Sanitation Programme (TSP) could be found in the rural areas being used as cattle yard or for other purposes such as places to keep firewood. Even today the toilets built under NBA are unused at large scale and open defecation remains unchanged in most part of the Indian villages and slums. 

As the name indicates the total sanitation could never address the issue in the comprehensive manner addressing all the nuances of the issue which is unfathomably complex in nature. It is evident that issues of rural sanitation were not just absence of structure of toilets. And it has ramifications beyond the economic backwardness. 

The community participation has become the rhetoric of every new schemes and programmes implemented by the state for the success and sustainability of the objectives; however they are doomed to fail due to the failure to prepare the community for a change prior to the implementation. The institutions including Panchayati Raj, other village committees like School Management Committee and Village Health Sanitation and Nutrition Committee remains as the hollow structures and a system merely established for the bureaucracy to prepare and submit documents to the department concerned, though the state envisaged the community participation for better accountability and effectiveness of the system. 

Rural population has been practicing open defecation for years and it was inconceivably an odd task for them to use latrines. They have many misconceptions about various aspects such as the septic tank‘s capacity to contain the human waste, if it’s hygienic to have toilet at home etc. The old generation could not break their habit and women and the persons with disability accepted the practical inconveniences as part of their routine life even to some extent it was the moment brought joy of being together in the wee hours of the day to share the ‘morning news’.  The availability of open space, human reluctance to begin a new habit, misconceptions about the hygiene of toilets, beliefs embedded by religious practices and ignorance compounded by the grim socio-economic conditions in the rural areas prompt the majority of the Indian population to continue their age old habit of open defecation and poor sanitation practices. NBA also failed to influence the young minds through campaigns at schools and other educational institutions to prepare them for a change.

                          

Untouchability was prevalent in pre-modern India and some castes were assigned mandatory to follow traditional occupations which were labeled unclean and impure. Manual scavenging was the duty of the untouchables. Cleaning the waste was never practiced by the higher caste. It has to be examined if the present generation of the higher caste prefers open defecation to using toilets as it is free from the task of cleaning.

What about the public toilets in Anganwadi, schools, health centres and hospitals etc? Most of them remain unclean or unable to be used as no one is accountable to maintain cleanliness. Though casteism exists, higher caste people do not dare to assign the task of cleaning toilets to the people from backward caste now, though such practice happen in interior areas of some states. In some schools, it is the duty of the children from backward class to clean the toilets and school premises while in some schools it is done in rotation. 

Sanitation is defined as ‘prevention of human contact with hazards of waste’. What about the state that designed a total sanitation campaign? The paradox in its policy is conspicuous in its failure to provide logistics to the labourers who get into drainages and manholes to remove the blockade. The situation is not different for the thousands of ‘Safai Karmacharies’ who collect waste in urban and rural areas. The situation is bleak for the last grade staff, sweepers of different state departments including railways who maintains cleanliness without even  gloves or other protective equipment for safe collection, separation and disposal.  It is not surprising to see that ‘the kacharawalas,’ whose absence a day would annoy the pleasant life of the rest of the community, belong to the socially and economically backward class, the modern ‘untouchables’.  The grim life of the rag pickers worsens with their contact with contaminated objects while collecting them to earn their bread. 

A well designed research could find myriads of other contradictions in the state policies to establish good sanitation practices in both urban and rural areas. Ultimately sanitation is not only an individual issue but a structural problem.

Are measures to minimize the birth rate of Children with Disabilities against the Rights of Persons with Disabilities?

It was during the training on strengthening Disabled Peoples Organizations (DPOs) that one of the groups among the participants happened to discuss the measures to prevent the birth of Children with Disabilities. The trainer immediately responded and said it was a controversial topic as it may be against the Rights of the Persons with Disabilities and it questions their dignified existence.  Preventing disability means the life of Persons with Disabilities is not worth or they do not live a life of dignity at present. As the Persons with Disability do not consider they are secondary or inferior to others, there is no question of talking about a world without Persons with Disabilities. The discussion went on. She added that it is alright talking about safe pregnancy and child birth.

It was hard to digest the argument at any level, even emotionally. It is true that all the causes of disability still remain to be unknown while there can be significant success in minimizing the birth of Children with Disability by taking care of mental and physical health care of childbearing women, proper post natal care, providing nutritious food for the children and early detection of issues of disability of the child etc. It is an indisputable fact that vast majority of the birth of the children with disability could be avoided through appropriate interventions. 

To my mind there were several reasons not to be an advocate of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities with regard to preventing the birth of Children with Disabilities. It is true that Persons with Disabilities have the right to live just like any other human being and any kind of discrimination towards them would be a grave violation of Human Rights. However the fact remains that all persons with disability could not enjoy the fullness of life not only due to the constraints of the world they are born but also due to the issues of disability which can be either physical or intellectual or the combination of both though disability is not a mere issue of deformity. 

Even millions of Persons without Disability are deprived of basic necessities, a blatant violation of their Right to life. The predicament of Persons with Disability is worse when they belong to low income groups. It is obvious that poverty and disability remains to be a vicious circle. The predicament of Persons with Mental Illness, Mental Retardation, Cerebral Palsy, Visual Impairment and Multiple Disabilities is worse than Peoples with Locomotor disability, Hearing Impairment, Low Vision and Autism.

 No one can deny the fact that Persons with Disability needs more care and protection from the vulnerabilities of the world. Millions of Persons with Disabilities including children do not even know about their Rights. Persons with Mental Illness or Mental Retardation may not even be able to articulate their Rights. It is truism to say that others speak on behalf of them.  Even the advocates of inclusive society would agree that Persons with Disability struggles more than other vulnerable sections of the society to enjoy the fullness of life in the world where injustice, oppression, inequality and suffering prevail to be a great menace for the development and prosperity of humanity. 

The question remains, can the advocates of the Rights Persons with Disabilities who are against taking preventive measures to minimize the birth of Children with Disabilities ensure the wellbeing of Persons with Disabilities of the future generations across the world living in multiple deprivations? What else guarantee a safe, free and prosperous life for millions of Persons with Disabilities living in bleak socio economic conditions?  There may be few such people who enjoy better prospects due to their immense capacity to fight the barriers, supportive socio economic conditions or the special care they got from family, community and other organizations which are not a universal reality.  What about the millions of others who are destined to struggle for their survival independently? Or on what ground can we consider life with disability a right or an inevitable reality such as gender, people with variety of  cognitive abilities, skills, interests , color and statures? 

Is it not practical to prevent disability for the known reasons and support the Persons who are born with disabilities for unknown or who became victims of  unanticipated  disasters, to fulfill their Rights and live a life of dignity and worth. Should we become so idealistic to argue that preventing birth of Children with Disabilities is against the Rights of Persons with Disabilities who are living among us? Wouldn’t it be better if medical science could eliminate all the causes of disabilities and every human being is born to this world at least without disabilities to add to his/her struggle for survival?

SARKAR KI KAKHI

It was when School Chalo Abhyiyan Rally was organized, students from Government and a Private school assembled together and I could feel the stark contrast between the sickly colour of Kakhi of Govt. school children and the colourful uniform of private school. Both schools were in the same village and the children too belong to the same area. The blunt difference in the colors of their uniform was a really strange sight.

We know that color is a powerful and important communication tool .Children are naturally attracted to bright colors which is why most toys and activities are brightly colored.

Most of us have a favourite colour and prefer some colours over others. This is because colors can affect our moods, so we surround ourselves in the colours that have a positive impact on our mood. For instance red can boost your energy and yellow often makes people feel happier. 

Colours have cultural significance as well. Color expert Faber Birrern carried out many studies into this area and in his book Color Psychology and Color Therapy; he states that for both gender, blue and red ‘maintaina high preference throughout life. He found a high preference throughout life. He also found that yellow is popular with children.

Children of both Govt. and Private School assembled together before the Rally

Uniforms

Many researchers agree that school uniforms policies have the greatest impact on student achievement when they are part of a larger comprehensive school reform plan. (Jones, 1998, Daughterty, 2002; Murrary, 2002).

There are several reasons that advocates of uniform suggest in favour of Uniforms. An increased level of sense of belonging amongst students has been attributed to school uniforms. Likewise, Murry (2002) reports that uniforms have been linked to increased self- esteem and confidence amongst students. Further he writes that uniforms focus students’ energy on learning rather than on seeking peer approval for their outfits. It also helps lowering the clothing costs. But it should not disregard the children’s innate desire for wearing some pleasant color dress.

When both colors and uniform have deepest meaning and significance, the education department must have been imaginative to choose a colour that would be appealing to the children’s interest. Though appearance can be deceptive, we all give prime importance to the appearance. How we look in the dress is a concern for everyone. The state government should have given consideration for the children’s interest and choose a different color that would not be as bland as kakhi.

School Chalo Abhiyan Rally in the Village of Dumri, Gorakhpur Dist.

During the rally children were shouting slogans to spread the message of importance of education and provisions in the Right to Education (RTE) Act. My mind was obsessed with myriads of unanswered questions. What could be the reason behind choosing Kakhi as the uniform? What would have happened if those children were given a different color of dresses? What the children would have felt when they see children in the same village wearing colorful uniforms? If they were given a choice, would kakhi be their choice? 

Among many other disparities the government school children are segregated by the choice of kakhi uniform as a sign of their colorless life in the classroom. May be the color of uniform may not be an issue for the children who even do not have a chair or bench to sit in their class room. They may not be fascinated about having  colorful clothes while noting in the classroom tempt to feel so. All my thoughts must be of an outsider who is ambitious about a rich life. Finally I too started shouting “Siksha Hamara Adhikar hei”