Not a single community toilet built by BMC this year, says the report

Giving the reasons for a covid-19 pandemic, BMC has neglected several other major issues and one of them is sanitation. As per a report, BMC has not constructed a single community toilet in 2020. In Mumbai, about 42 percent of households do not have toilets on their premises, and about 94 percent of them are dependent on community toilets.

 

BMC permitted a contract of Rs 422 crore in January 2019 for about 22,774 toilets, but only 20 percent of the promised toilets are constructed after two years. As per the Praja Organization report of 2021, the number of toilets is the same as the previous years. Which implies that no new construction has been done. There were only one in four public toilets for women.

 

BMC was supposed to build 16,703 toilets on existing 14,173 toilet seats, and 6,071 toilets on the new locations, under the slum sanitation plan. The civic body did not even provide the data of the toilets constructed in 2020. Supriya Sonar, an activist from the right to pee movement has targeted BMC saying, “We understand that these are testing times, they (BMC) have started the work after seven months, but the progress is very slow. The basic hygiene is very important in the slums, as they are at high risk for the third wave of the pandemic.” 

 

The BMC officials blamed the pandemic lockdown situation and clarified that “The work got stopped during the first wave, but after October 2020, it got resumed and many toilets are about to complete now.” Experts prescribe one seat for 35 men and 25 women, while currently there is one seat for 42 men and 34 women.