New Delhi, December 09:"Rural areas in all the States and Union Territories have become Open Defecation Free in the country", said Minister of State for Jal Shakti Rattan Lal Kataria in the upper house of parliament today adding that the urban areas of all the States and Union Territories except West Bengal had been declared Open Defecation Free.
"Over 10 crore individual household latrines were constructed under the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin). Over 60 lakh individual household latrines were constructed under the Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban)", he noted while submitting the reply to the House.
"Ending open defecation is an indicator being used to measure progress towards the Sustainable Development Goal. Extreme poverty and lack of sanitation are statistically linked. Therefore, eliminating open defecation is thought to be an important part of the effort to eliminate poverty", the Minister noted.
Open defecation is the human practice of defecating outside rather than into a toilet. The practice is common where sanitation infrastructure and services are usually not available. The term 'open defecation free' is used to describe communities that have shifted to using a toilet instead of open defecation.
The current estimate reveals that around 673 million people practise open defecation that is down from about 892 million people, or 12 percent of the global population, who practiced open defecation in 2016. In that year, seventy-six percent, 678 million of the 892 million people practicing open defecation in the world live in just seven countries.
The reasons for open defecation are varied, can be a voluntary, semi-voluntary or involuntary choice. Most of the time, a lack of access to a toilet is the reason. However, in some places even people with toilets in their houses prefer to defecate in the open.
There are several drivers that can be used to eradicate open defecation, one of which is behaviour change like political will, sanitation solutions that offer a better value than open defecation, stronger public sector local service delivery systems, creation of the right incentive structures and more.