Learning from India’s massive, country-wide people’s movement to end open defecation

By Rolf Luyendijk, Executive Director, WSSCC

India may be the world’s largest democracy, with 815 million eligible voters with access to the ballot. Much less a source of pride is the fact that, historically, so few Indians have access to a toilet. This situation is changing fast, however.

As of 2014, for 550 million people in India with no toilet access, open defecation was widespread. Contamination of soil and water and exposure to disease and illness contrived to arrest all hope of escaping poverty’s grip.

Now, just four years later, the Government of India reports that the number of people in India with access to toilets has grown by 400 million. It is a dramatic change for the better, but how did this happen?

In fact, it has been a long time coming. While leading a non-violent movement for India’s independence from the British in 1947, Mahatma Gandhi spoke about the need to improve hygiene and cleanliness in the country. “Sanitation is more important than political independence,” he said. Last month, in an address on waste management and cleanliness, India’s President Pranab Mukherjee, reiterated Gandhi’s decades old exhortation.

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