This document proposes using mobile phones to spread awareness about sanitation in rural India. It begins by outlining the poor state of sanitation in India, with only 21% of rural populations having access and only 14% using existing facilities. The plan is to identify areas with low sanitation access, record voice messages in local languages about hygiene, and broadcast them through mobile networks. Telecom companies would fund the messages through corporate social responsibility programs. The impact would be monitored by factors like healthcare costs and school attendance. This targeted, low-cost mobile approach could more effectively spread hygiene awareness than current methods.

1. Team Details
Himanshu Panday, Kirti Singh, Hariprasad KV, Upasna Rana, Midhun George
Manthan Topic
Towards Cleaner India: Providing clean drinking water and
proper sanitation facility to all

2. Only 21 % of India’s rural population have access to sanitation facilities, out of which
only 14% actually use that.
Present Scenario of Sanitation in India:
88
15
6.4
31 28
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Access to Clean
Water
Child
Moratality
(Below 5 )
GDP loss
because of
Improper
Sanitation
Access to
Improoved
Sanitation
Facilities
Health Care
facilities within
5 kms
79%
14%
7%
Sanitation Conditions In Rural India
People who don't have
access to proper
sanitation facilities
People who use sanitation
facilities
People who have access
to sanitation facilities but
don't use
42%
58%
Sanitation Conditions in Urban India
People who don't have
access to proper
sanitation facilities
People who have access
to proper sanitation
facilities
97
90
0
20
40
60
80
100
People who have access to clean
drinking water in Urban Area
People who have access to clean
drinking water in Rural Area
Present Clean Drinking Water
Scenario in India
Source: Word-Bank Data, Ministry of Drinking water & Sanitation, Reports of Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan, Unicef Reports .

3. Causes of Improper Sanitation in India:
• No access to sanitation facility
• Psychological aspects related to restricted use of
existing sanitation facility (Regional, Religion Faith,
Tradition)
• Social Acceptance
• Lack of awareness
• Lack of Maintenance of existing sanitation facility
• Child feces are considered to be harmless
• Shortage of water
Effects of Improper sanitation:
• Increased danger of communicable diseases, Like- Diarrhea,
Cholera etc.
• Safety issues of women and girls
• High mortality rate of children under 5
• Increased cost of healthcare
• Decreased productivity of Nation
• Degraded quality of domestic water resources

4. Existing Government Policies & Plans:
Initiative Description Target Shortcomings
Nirmal
Bharat
Abhiyan
• Construction of Individual Household Latrines
• Rural Sanitary Marts and Production Centers
• Community Sanitary Complex
• Institutional Toilets- School and Anganwadi
• Solid and Liquid Waste Management
• Maintenance of facilities created under NBA
• Motivate communities and Panchayati Raj
Institutions promoting sustainable sanitation
facilities through awareness creation and health
education.
• Accelerate sanitation coverage
in rural areas to achieve the
vision of Nirmal Bharat by
2022 with all gram Panchayats
in the country attaining Nirmal
status.
• To make India Open
Defecation Free (ODF) by
2022.
• Households that have
benefited once would not
be eligible for any further
assistance.
• No or very less involvement
of private sector.
• Less clarity at ground level
implementation
• Issue of local leadership.
Nirmal
Gram
Puraskar
• An award based Incentive Scheme for fully
sanitized and open defecation free Gram
Panchayats, Blocks, Districts and States.
• launched to recognise the achievements and
efforts made in ensuring full sanitation coverage.
• Improving and maintaining
sanitation facilities.
• Solid & Liquid Waste
Management and Creation of
additional sanitation facilities
• Ofiicial’s vested interests
in clocking higher
numbers
• Quality of total sanitation
not assured before
awarding the status
National
Rural
Drinking
Water
Programme
• Associated with problem of sustainability, water
availability and supply, poor water quality.
• Emphasize on water supply systems which are
planned and managed by the village community.
• sustainable drinking water availability, convenient
delivery systems and achieving water security at the
household level.
• To ensure 100 percent
drinking water availability to
everyone.
• Maintenance of existing
facility with community
efforts.
• Though the initiative have
performed excellent by
achieving 91% people
access to clean water, but
misappropriation of funds
is the major issue.
Scope of challenge:
• 4 out of 5 people in rural India doesn’t have access to proper sanitation facility.
• GDP loss due to improper sanitation conditions is 6.4 %.
• On an average, 3 out of 10 children in villages are not able to survive above 5 year because of improper sanitation conditions.
• 4 out of 10 people in rural area who have access to sanitation facilities don’t use it because of less awareness.
• On an average, each family (approx. family size – 4 members) in rural India has mobile phone but only one fourth of them have access to
toilets.

5. • National Rural Drinking Water Programme has shown an excellent performance at real grounds
and achieved target of clean drinking water access to 91% population.
• Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan gives most emphasis upon construction and maintenance of proper
sanitation facility. Though spreading awareness is second motive of this initiative but the
awareness campaign seems ineffective.
• 4 out of 10 people who have access to sanitation facility, doesn’t use the sanitation facility
because of lack of awareness.
• 40% people in rural area uses mobile phones. It means that even if we consider a minimum
family size of 4, each family has mobile phone. While only 2 people out of 10 have access to
sanitation facility.
• In the same scenario, even if there will be 100% access to sanitation facility in rural India, 40 %
people would not use it due to lack of awareness. So spreading awareness is an important
aspect in achieving Nirmal Bharat target.
Selection of medium for spreading awareness:
• Television has good presence in
locations which are connected to road
network however interior villages are
excluded. But since people use it for
entertainment proposes, Its reliability
is low. Ex- People may not watch
awareness advertisements and can
switch the channels.
• Doctors, ASHA can be another medium
but their exposure is limited.
• Gram Panchayat Representatives are
not reliable because of lack of
communication.
• School teachers can also be a part of
awareness campaign but there
exposure is limited to school going
children only.
• Mobile phones are emerging new
media channels with strong potential.
Television
Mobile
Phones
Loudspeaker Posters
School
Teacher
Radio,
PRI
News Paper Doctors,
ASHA
Reliability
E
x
p
o
s
u
r
e
Low Medium High
LowMediumHigh

6. Plan
Advantage over
existing sanitation
Campaign
Use of Mobile phones as media channel for spreading awareness regarding improper sanitation habits
• Identification of regions with poor sanitation conditions and their
specific sanitation problems.
• Convincing Telecommunication service provider for utilizing funds
related to CSR(Corporate Social Responsibility) in this campaign and
broadcast voice messages related to improper sanitation habits.
• Recording of voice messages in regional language.
• Monitoring of sanitation related parameters in the particular region.
• High reliability because of pushing nature of model.
• Since voice messages links expenditure on health care with
sanitation habits, which has more impact over stakeholders.
• Audio messages in regional language have more impact than
existing printed posters or news paper advertisements.
• Operational cost of campaign is not a burden on government budget
since funds can be managed through CSR only.
• This method of spreading awareness is having very high and even
exposure among stakeholders.

7. 1. Division of rural area on the basis
of percentage of people with
access to proper sanitation
facilities.
2. Arranging them in order while
giving priority to the region with
least access.
3. Carrying out research in divided
areas to find out specific
sanitation problems. Research
methods can include surveying,
informal communication or
formal interview.
4. Making of a formal document
stating particular area of rural
India and specific sanitation
problem of that area.
Plan and Implementation
A. Identification of
regions with poor
sanitation conditions
and their specific
sanitation problems:
B. Involvement of
Telecommunication
Service provider
1. According to clause no. 135 of new
companies bill, companies with a net
worth of more than ₹ 500 crore or
revenue of more than ₹ 1,000 crore or
net profit of more than ₹ 5 crore have
to spend at least 2% of their average
net profits of the preceding 3 years on
CSR. It means that telecommunication
giants like Airtel and Vodafone will have
to spend around ₹ 13-17 crores in
activities related to corporate social
responsibility.
2. These telecommunication service
providers can be convinced to use this
fund of CSR for broadcasting voice
messages about good sanitation habits
before call.
3. Since they can do it by using their
existing setup so it is feasible for them.
Spending one rupee at sanitation facilities saves 9 rupees in terms of health care,
education and economic development.

8. C. Recording and broadcasting of voice
messages related to sanitation habits
1. Awareness messages would cover the following topics:
• Linkage between expenditure on healthcare and
sanitation habits.
• Awareness about the need of proper sanitation
Awareness about how improper sanitation effects health
• Open defecation is a shame
• Safety of their beloved ones
• Proper sanitation is more important than independence
Proper sanitation is the best preventive medicine. Proper
sanitation contributes to gender equality, access to
education and dignity.
• Improper sanitation reduces poverty and fosters
economic growth.
• Proper sanitation sustains human settlement and
protects our planet's environment.
• Messages requesting people to take part in the
campaign and spread the message.
2. The messages shouldn’t be repetitive.
3. The messages should be short – 10 seconds and it should
come before the actual communication takes place.
4. The messages may be recorded in the voice of prominent
celebrities.
5. The messages need not show up for every call that a
person makes in a day, as it might become irritating and
forceful. Time can be selected according to sanitation
problems
6. The campaign will go for one month as a small project only
after which the effectiveness of the campaign will be studied.
D. Feedback: Monitoring of Sanitation
related parameters in the particular region
1. This idea can be implemented at a very small scale.
2. Some parameters can be used for measuring results of campaign
like-
• Percentage access to proper sanitation facilities,
• Reduction in child mortality rate
• Decreased expenditure on health-care
• Increased school attendance of children
• Increased productivity
• Reduction in no of deaths occurred due to communal diseases
etc.
3. Other methods can include surveying, informal communication
or formal interview.
4. The results will be the measure of success of campaign.
5. If this pilot project is successful then this can be implemented
over large scale.
6. Data came through this feedback will be compared with data
came through the first step and a comparative study will be done
between them to have a good understanding of effects of
campaign.
In India, more than 1000 children under 5 years of age die each day
only because of diarrhea caused by lack of sanitation.

9. Impact:
• Since the flow of awareness is in pyramid
manner, response might be quick. Ex-
Information is passing to children through
elder family members, so they are likely to
follow sanitation habits.
• Audio messages in regional language has
more impact then existing paper posters
and newspaper advertisements because of
lower literacy among stakeholders.
Reach:
• Mobile communication is a
potential media channel in
both urban and rural area
with a wide reach.
• It covers a broad age
spectrum.
• Involvement in regional
language may make a great
reach among stakeholders.
Challenges:
• In equal gender penetration ( Mobile phone usage is biased towards male in rural areas).
• In emergency cases, people might not like this intervention but probability is very low because of
restricted timings of broadcasting.
• People using mobile only for receiving call might not get covered.
• Maintaining a cordial relationship between government and private authorities can be a problem, but
intervention of DOT (Department of Telecommunication) can make it smoother.

10. References
• Swajal Nirmal Bharat, News letter, Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation.
• World Development Indicators, World Databank
• Nationally representative survey of diarrhoeal deaths: World Bank
• UNICEF’s report on Child health and sanitation
• Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan- beyond the hype: Livemint
• Squatting rights – Dasra
• Economics of Sanitation Initiative: WSP (Water and sanitation program)
• Progress on Sanitation and Drinking Water: Unicef
• What is ailing sanitation sector in India: D S Kapur, Water Aid India
• Reports of National Rural Drinking Water Programme
• Reports ofNirmal Bharat Abhiyan
• Reports of Nirmal Gram Puruskar