In Association with
Department of Panchayatiraj and Rural Development
State Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin),
Government of Madhya Pradesh
Technical Support
UNICEF
District: Mandsaur
Village: Khodana
Submitted by:
Aayush Mathur
Abhijat Mittal
Ankita Koshta
Nupur Malhotra
1. Executive summary of field visit done: (half page)
Our team visited Khodana, a village in the Mandsaur district of Madhya Pradesh. The
village had 300+ households in total, with 2 schools (1 Primary and 1 secondary) and 1
Anganwadi. The village had been declared ODF in November 2016. Our objective was to
validate this claim made by the village. Based on visits to schools, aanganwadis and more
than 40 households, we tabulated our observations and identified various problems
within the village. There were toilets in almost 95% of the households. These were
primarily constructed last year in November and due to the incentive provided by the
SBM, which provided the households with toilets with Rs.12000 on successful validation.
Even then, some villagers were found defecating in the open. Solid and Liquid waste
management was non-existent, as solid waste was dumped without treatment and there
were blockages in flow of waste water. The village can be declared ODF as an extremely
small proportion of villagers defecate in the open, however its sustainability has to be
tested.
3. Day 1
On the 5th December, we headed to the village at 6:30 am. We were accompanied by GRS
to the village and visited a lot of households on the way. It was impressive to see that
almost all the households had individual toilets. There were no water tanks to facilitate the
usage of the toilets. Villagers only had access to water pumps which were scarcely
distributed. Due to the difficulty in carrying the water every time from the pumps to the
toilets, some of them refrained from using the toilets and instead defecated openly.
We had a discussion with the villagers regarding the utility of the toilets, the government
initiative of Swachh Bharat and its importance. We found that people were aware of the
government schemes & the benefits of using toilets.
Toilets found in almost all households
4. Day 2
We visited 22 households to check the status of toilets and solid and liquid waste
management. We found that there were toilets constructed in all households. All of them
were constructed in November 2016, during the ODF drive initiated by the village officials.
But after our field visit we found that among the households in the village, 5-10% people
still do not use the toilet. Most of them were old people. Old people were habituated in
open defecation and were unwilling to listen to outsiders.
Issues emerged during discussion with community sections regarding ODF sustainability
mechanism in districts- The main issue according to the villagers regarding ODF
sustainability was their habits and a fear, that the soak pit will fill up quickly if they used it
often. Another problem was the convenience they had, as they used to defecate near their
well, which was also where their cattle defecated, and thus they had easy access to water
and the convenience of handling both problems in one go only.