Mumbai: BMC didn’t build a single community toilet in a year

A community toilet being constructed in Govandi. File pic

The civic body has put sanitation in cold storage in the name of Covid-19 if one were to go by its record on building community toilets. As per a report by Praja Foundation, the BMC did not construct a single such toilet in 2020. The apathy over ablutions comes at a time when about 42 per cent households in the city do not have a toilet on their premises and over 94 per cent of them depend on community lavatories.

As per data collected by Praja, an organisation focussed on enabling accountable governance, through Right to Information, the BMC cleared proposals worth Rs 422 crore in January 2019 for 22,774 toilets with a target to build them in a year. However, it managed to construct about 20 per cent of them after two years.

Although the Swachh Bharat Mission pivots around toilets, Praja's report on the status of civic issues in 2021 says the number of public and community toilets in the city is the same as the previous year. In 2020, only one in 4 public toilets were for women.

"It was an unprecedented situation and we can say the BMC had kept the work aside for some time to concentrate on Covid-19 related work at that time, but the authorities should also keep in mind that in the long term, basic facilities like community toilets affect livelihoods. It also impacts the education and health level of society and we have to check our priorities now," said Milind Mhaske, director of Praja Foundation.

Drawing a parallel with the Coastal Road project, he said though they are not opposed to the corridor, they expect the civic corporation to give similar priority to community toilets.

Under its Slum Sanitation Plan, the BMC was supposed to build 16,703 toilets on existing 14,173 toilet seats and an additional 6,071 toilets on new locations. The most number of toilets, about 10,000, was allotted to M East ward consisting of Govandi and Mankhurd. As per official data, 4,596 toilet blocks were completed till December 2020. The BMC did not provide a break-up of how many toilets were built in 2020 alone.

"We understand and communicate with people that it is an unusual condition. They have started the work after seven months but it is going at a snail's speed and will take decades if it goes at the same pace. The construction started after demolishing the old structure and building a temporary one. But now the life of these temporary structures has also come to an end," said Supriya Sonar, an activist from the Right to Pee movement.

She added that toilets are more important as slums are at the risk of the third wave and "we have to focus on the hygiene of common toilets".

Civic officials blamed the lockdown for the state of affairs. "Some of the toilets got completed this year. The work was stopped completely during the lockdown of the first wave - from April to October 2020. Even the labourers were shifted to build toilets for Covid-19 centres. But after October [2020], the work resumed and many toilet blocks are about to complete," said Assistant Municipal Commissioner Kiran Dighavkar, who is a nodal officer for the Swachh Bharat Mission.

Based on the Census slum population figures, there is currently one toilet seat per 42 men and 34 women, while the SBM prescribes one seat for 35 men and 25 women respectively.