Open Defecation Problem in India

Last class, we had an interesting speaker who talked about the problem of open defecation in India. The speaker emphasized the cultural aspect of the problem. Although, I totally agree that understanding the cultural influence and achieving a high level of cultural competence is crucial before designing any intervention, I believe that we should deeply investigate what is behind these cultural factors. People tend to go for open defecation because they prefer the open air and for socialization especially for the females. However; they were not provided by the ideal latrine that could help modifying their deeply rooted cultural norms regarding open defecation. The latrines that they were supplied with were not well ventilated, with bad smell, dark, accessible to animals and snakes, and most importantly, from my point of view, is that such pit latrines need to be cleaned manually and without water. Such way of cleaning pits will increase Indians cultural resistance and will make their social construction of reality regarding using open defecation versus latrines more deeply rooted as such latrines will remind them with the historical caste prejudice of the colonial practices. In my opinion, such intervention by the government to combat the problem of open defecation was the worst proposed solution to the problem. The speaker emphasized that even if the ideal latrines were provided to Indians, they would not use them because of their cultural influences. However; I have some reservations on this idea. Despite, few Indians link open defecation to health, they have many other negative concerns regarding open defecation such as female embarrassment and sexual harassment, risk of robberies, risks of going out at night, slipping in feces, animal attacks, parasites, flies and mosquitoes … etc. Such negative concerns are ideal points for public health interventions to tackle this problem as they will be cultural facilitators if the ideal alternative is present. However; the main obstacle which, from my point of view, is the lack of water, will remain as the major challenge. How can we provide such ideal latrine without adequate water sources? How can we convince Indians to stop open defecation and they see it as the cleanest and best solution?

In my opinion, intervention to this issue will not be successful without directing our scope to water problems. Diarrhea is the second leading cause of death among Indians with lack of safe water being the key underlying cause. This is another incentive to tackle water problems. Water and sanitation are interrelated and influenced by one another. Cultural values and individual behavior modifications regarding open defecation cannot be attained without making the environment conductive to such modifications and this cannot be achieved without prioritizing water problems. Guaranteeing safe water is no longer a privilege, it is a right, necessity and political obligation.