Education and its role in a healthy future for India’s kids
The UN General Assembly in July 2010 had adopted a resolution officially recognising sanitation – “access to, and use of, excreta and wastewater facilities and services” – as a human right. For most of human history, people defecated in the open. But in the last century, a lot has changed with toilets becoming an integral part of homes in most parts of the world. Increased access to sanitation is one of the sweeping changes in humanity’s ‘Great Escape’ as Nobel laureate Angus Deaton put it. The simple flush toilet is often taken for granted in higher income homes but a lot of low income homes in India don’t have access to toilets, denying them the basic human rights. The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan focuses on increasing access to sanitation as an integral part of the mission.
The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan was launched by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on October 2, 2014. As on February 2018, we are nearing 80 per cent of the Swachh Bharat target in construction of toilets in rural India with more than 6.25 crore toilets constructed. No country in world history has ever built so many toilets at a stretch and provided access to sanitation to its people in this scale. It is an achievement that every Indian can be proud of. According to the Union budget, Swachh Bharat Mission has made tremendous progress; sanitation coverage has gone up from 42 per cent in October 2013 to 60 per cent now.
But infrastructure, while it solves a part of the problem, cannot completely solve for another — behaviour change. Open defecation in India is not just about toilet coverage. It is also about deeply ingrained cultural practices. In a lot of homes in India’s heartland, a toilet in the front yard of the home —an area earmarked for the holy Tulsi plant, is an unholy idea and so, is detested. Toilets are considered impure and a reason for that can be found in India’s millenniaold caste system. According to Diane Coffey and Dean Sears, authors of ‘Where India Goes’, the reason for the aversion to toilets comes from the fact that manual scavenging was traditionally the job of the oppressed castes. Even with many people in positions of power and responsibility, ministers and top bureaucrats showing the way by emptying toilet pits themselves, this hostility to toilets remains in rural India.
Deep-rooted ideas about hygiene are not limited to just toilets. There is a very strong belief in the idea that water that looks clean is fit enough to drink. Water filters or boiling water is not considered to be a necessity. It may have been true centuries ago when water sources were not polluted. But post industrialisation and population explosion, the ground water as well as other sources are definitely polluted almost everywhere. Hand washing is another area where deeply ingrained belief systems stop people from adopting a healthy habit. Using soaps to wash hands is not considered essential in most of rural India. We are losbecause ing out as a nation of these unscientific beliefs. While the rest of the world is moving ahead towards a healthier future,
India may lose out. For the demographic dividend to be an asset, we need healthier young people, not unhealthy individuals.
To change the age-old belief systems and get the country into the 21st century, we need to look at creating lasting change in the minds of people. And behaviour change works best when done early. In many villages in rural India, something interesting strikes you if you are a keen observer. First generation school goers are much more likely to ignore caste boundaries. The schools have changed them for good. The old rules that prohibit inter mingling and inter dining do not hold fort in schools where friendships extend beyond artificial boundaries such as caste.
Education holds the key to long term change in sanitation behaviour change. The next generation needs to learn about the need for hygiene and sanitation at the place where they learn the other important things of life — school. We need to build a generation that doesn’t hold on to mistaken beliefs on sanitation but one that understands the need for toilets, clean water, hygiene, cleanliness etc. Hygiene is as important, if not more important than arithmetic, reading and writing.
The Swachh Aadat curriculum is a 21-day curriculum that is created to teach children in the age group of 5 to 10 the importance of hygiene. The curriculum teaches children about germs and about three important habits — washing hands at five critical occasions throughout the day, drinking purified water and using toilets and keeping them clean. The curriculum is taught in classrooms with the help of teachers for a time duration of approximately 20 minutes for 21 days.
To make the curriculum interesting for the children who are the target group for this intervention, characters such as Chamatkari Sonu (a superhero) and Kitabyutor (Kitab + Computer), activities, games etc are used effectively. The curriculum combines classroom teaching with practical demonstrations to influence children positively. Children are not just encouraged to learn for themselves; they are transformed into change agents bringing a sanitation revolution in their communities. The curriculum is taught in the schools through books or the e-curriculum in schools/states where the required technological infrastructure is already present.
The Swachh Aadat curriculum will create a generation of Indians that grows up understanding the importance of hygiene within their formative years ensuring the long term success of the initiatives being undertaken in water, sanitation and hygiene in India today.