Centre launches bio-toilets to curb open defecation

Around 100,000 toilets to be built in next two years in 300 gram panchayats

World Toilet Conference

Over 300 million Indians still defecate in the open: WHO-UNICEF report

Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan do much better in improving access to sanitation

Why India remains malnourished

Despite a fast-growing economy and the largest anti-malnutrition programme, India has the world’s worst level of child malnutrition. The …

Punjab closer to ODF sustainability with community toilet guidelines

Recommendations not clear on how to treat waste, reuse groundwater   

Govt shifts focus to sustaining sanitation coverage

The Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation prepares a rural sanitation strategy to maintain open-defecation free status and clear up waste issues

Rural poor yet to see benefits of improving sanitation in Tanzania

Open defecation has reduced from 20% in 2012 to 5% in 2017 but benefits have largely gone to the rich

Ethiopia curbed open defecation at fastest rate; what can India learn?

Unlike India, Ethiopia has recognised sanitation as a health problem and focused on behavioural change over toilet construction

Toilet-linked biogas plants tackle faecal sludge problem in Gujarat’s villages

The system not only prevented open defecation, addressed septage issue, but also gave easy access to clean and cheap fuel for cooking needs

Open defecation continues despite new toilets

Removing open defecation was one of the most touted goals of Swachh Bharat Mission, backed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Lakhs of toilets have …

'Poor sanitation not only has a health dimension but also an economic and environmental one'

Down To Earth spoke to Kebede Worku, Ethiopia's State Minister for Health, on the turnaround that his country has brought about in the field of …

Is open defecation back in India?  

The latest WHO-UNICEF data shows at least one-sixth of India’s rural population still defecate in the open and a quarter doesn’t have …

After WASH report, burden of eradicating open defecation shifts to Africa

Around 196 million of the 494 million people practising open defecation in the world are from sub-Saharan Africa

The cleanest cities of India: Indore tops the chart

Indore has also been ranked the cleanest city of India in Swachh Survekshan Surveys since 2017

Access to drinking water, sanitation improve across states, urban-rural divide remains: NFHS-5

Despite progress on sanitation front, several states reported every third or fourth person having no access to improved facilities

Inaugural issue of Down To Earth Hindi exposes poor progress of Swachh Bharat Mission

Besides pointing out the associated risks of poor sanitation, the analysis also shows the enormous challenge before the NDA government

Open defecation in Nigeria: Faecal sludge is country's clicking time bomb

The country, which has the largest number of people defacting in the open, needs to frame a safe toilet technology and treat its faecal sludge, …

ODF India: Is a critical government survey on toilet access, use being withheld?

According to high-level government sources, the survey results contradict the government’s open-defecation free status claim

New study points out how ODF villages are better off

Non-ODF villages much more at risk of contamination, finds study by Centre, UNICEF 

No toilet, no food; is this how India will become ODF?

Kiran Bedi's order, suspending free rice distribution scheme for Puducherry's poorest families from end of May unless they produce a certificate …

Cleaning a dirty patch

There has been a massive spike in constructing toilets in record time in Gonda district. But it remains to be seen whether it would lead to real …

Begging to whistling, rural India doing everything to end open defecation

Several villages in India are coming up with out-of-the-box ideas to discourage open defecation

India leads the world’s failure story in eradicating open defecation, malnutrition

New WHO-UNICEF report warns that lack of progress on sanitation would undermine gains from access to safe drinking water

Sub-Saharan Africans spend 60 hours a year finding a private place to defecate

The state of sanitation is deteriorating in Sub-Saharan Africa, with countries switching from open defecation to unsafe toilets

World Water Day: Solving water issues key to achieving ODF status

Here’s an example of a village in Nagaland that journeyed from being one of the most backward districts in India to being open defecation free