After the BMC declared the B and C wards open-defecation free last July, it has now declared two more wards free of open defecation in the city. The D ward in South Mumbai and the T ward in the eastern suburbs have been given this status after the civic body conducted a survey recently of the existing and new toilet blocks in the city.
The move comes in after the BMC constructed toilets in the spots that were identified as locations of open defecation in the ward. Following this, the number of open defecation spots in the city have been brought down to 111 from the previous 117.
As of 2016, the D ward had a deficiency of 517 toilet seats, whereas the T ward had a deficiency of 1,543 toilet seats, based on the population in each ward. As per the solid waste management rules, there has to be one toilet seat for every 25 women and one for every 35 men in the ward.
A senior civic official from the solid waste management department said, “This need not mean we have met the requirement of the number of toilet seats needed in each of these wards. We will continue to construct toilet seats in both these wards upto 2019, as per our earlier five-year plan, to meet the deficiency of seats. We have just ensured that the spots where open defecation was practiced now have toilets.”
However, a civic official of the solid waste management department who looks after this project said, “The BMC has done its bit by making toilets accessible to people in this area. The real challenge is to get them to use these toilets. So we are now conducting routine awareness programs especially in the slums in both these wards.”
The D ward has a slum population of approximately 3,000 people whereas the T ward has a slum population of about 7,500 people.
