Ram Rattan Sharma
Contaminated water and poor sanitization or linked to transmission of diseases such as cholera, diarrohea, dysentery, hepatitis A, Typhoid and Polio. Inappropriately managed water and sanitation services expose individuals to preventable health risk. Sanitization is the hygienic means of promoting health through prevention of human contact with the hazards of washes as well as the treatment and proper disposal of sewage or waste water. Hazards can be physical, micro-biological, biological or chemical agents of diseases. Wastes that can cause health problems include humans and animal excreta.
While unsafe drinking water as part of environmental health has long been realized as critical to healthy life, Improved sanitation in India has of late, been recognised as essential for provisioning Safe drinking water. This is because people get exposed to faecal transmitted infections through exposure to faecal in their environments, which can result from open defecation and poorly constructed toilets. Approximately 88% of diarroheal deaths in children can be attributed to unsafe water supply, inadequate sanitation, and hygiene behaviour .In 2017 ,WHO estimated that 5,25,000 children under five died due to diarroheal diseases, globally, out of which 1,17,000 children under five died in India. Therefore, environmental health and resilience are only as good as the investment in sustainable and effective sanitation and safe water provisions. The system for Solid and Liquid waste management, including faecal sludge management and drainage, are important for better prevention of faecal contamination in the environment. Attaining safely managed water and sanitation requires policies that invest more on frame work seeking to go beyond simply providing toilets and water supply. They must encourage community and individual ownership over the results to ensure positive, long term outcomes. Since 2014, over 10 crore toilets have been built in rural areas. Over 5.9 lakh villages, 699 districts, and 35 states and union territories have declared themselves open defecation free. The ten year rural sanitation strategy aims to achieve the vision of ODF- Plus, which focuses on sustaining behaviour change achieved under SBM , universal usage of sanitation facilities, inclusion of new households, as well as effective Solid and Liquid Waste disposal. The type of toilets constructed in the entire sanitation programming in India is mainly of three categories, single leachpit, twin leachpit and septic tanks. Single pits need retrofitting-either converting it into twin pits with consideration of space, so that the human excreta over the time degrade completely and turn to solid pathogen free manure for agricultural use or making provisions to empty the pit periodically. Similarly, the effluent from septic tank, under no circumstances, should be allowed into an open channel drain or body of water without treatment. Experience from the field says that majority of septic tank designs are faulty which are used as holding tanks of sewage. The liquid waste of house hold and community including human excretam some septic tanks are found to be connected to open drains, agricultural fields ,country-yard ,and rivers. These contaminate water, soil and some agricultural products, which is detrimental to health. As per the Indian standard code for installation of septic tank, the unsatisfactory design constructions, and maintenance of septic tanks constitute health hazard. It is therefore, considered essential to lay down minimum standard for guidance of concerned authorities. At this junction of ODF Plus initiatives both single leachpit toilets and septic tanks would be challenging as far as faecal sludge and septage management is concerned. Programmers with special focus on toilets retrofitting and more of managing the substructure of toilet units both at house hold and community level are needed. Proper septic tanks offer a preliminary treatment of sewage prior to final disposal which restricts damaging the environment by protecting water sources and soil.
Ministry of Jal Shakti issued Jal Jeevan guidance note in March 2019, which informs that only 18.33% of rural households in the country are connected through piped water supply. The present estimate being discussed is around 14.60 crore rural households that will need functional household tap connection at the rate of 55 liters per capita per day through JJM by 2024. This ambitious target setting of 100 percent coverage of functional house hold tap connection from their current 18% demands the rise of an adequate and proportional pool of skilled human resources, institutional strengthening, strategic planning consistent monitoring including on site field verification, supportive supervision , and participation of community members at local level.
Water quality testing is a tool that is universally used to identify state of drinking water, whether at source, with in a piped distribution system, or at point of use by consumers as per WHO, the most effective means of consistently ensuring the safety of a drinking water supply is using a comprehensive risk management approach that encompasses all steps in water supply from catchment to consumer, considering the importance of ensuring safe drinking water quality monitoring protocol in March 2019. The protocol is suggestive in nature and plays an advisory role in guiding and supporting the states and union territories in water quality testing, monitoring and surveillance activities effectively. The protocols speak in detail on the monitoring of water quality using field test kit at the gram panchayat level and confirmation test at water testing laboratories and water quality surveillance, to detect the risk through an investigative activity for identifying and evaluating the factors that can pose risk to health directly or through undesirable environmental conditions.
While the country has been declared to be free from the practice of open defecation, it is pertinent to continue looking at the necessity for faecal sludge and septage management, ,without which the quality and safety of drinking water may be affected negatively. Concurrently, it is also important to look at the possible challenges posed by intermittent water supply and the interaction between pipes and their external surrounding due to flux in water pressure.
Safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene are crucial to human health and well being. Safe water is not only a pre-requisite to health, but contributes to livelihood, school attendance and dignity and helps to create resilient communities living in healthy environments.
Overall, to ensure the success of Jal Jeevan mission or any other programmes catering to rural communities, it is crucial to involve gram panchayats and village water and sanitation committees in the decision making processes. This will ensure ownership over and sustain ability of any achievements made over the coming years and once communities can tangibly appreciate the value of a functioning system, they would be more willing to invest in operations and maintenance efforts that will be necessary down the line. Therefore, it is important that Govt.’s at all levels work together with local leaders and representatives, who rise to become champions of the cause. So that resources can he synergized to gain maximum outputs.
(The author is former Dy. Librarian
of Jammu University)
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