Toilet Nation
Can i please use the loo plzzzzzzzzzzzzz veri
urgent.....................how many might muster courage in asking our guests
or even places we visit when in need. Most do now.
But most (not sure if there would be a
protest for 'MOST') merrily wet the nearest and publicly visible
wall-thicket-bush-rubbish dump (which many in India can spot easily) and
corporation playgrounds. When i say most i do not include my close friends
because i know my friends, but often near my home or on way to work i find well
dressed especially with a silk tie around their neck struggling to negotiate a
tie from getting wet rather than my glaring eyes. The man is in no mood to
resist his urge.
Most Tamil speakers conveniently mutter 'Aatarathe
adakalaam anaal avasarathe adka mudiyaathu'. And after saying this
legally approved phrase, the peeing continues and that too with a gang of
peers with sound of approval and the guy who questions them is a pariah for
that moment. Hence fearing these jeering sounds I as a college going student
would join them to assert my group's friendship, but in reality never peed in
groups.
Wondering how peeing would give me the
identity. Years passed knowledge has accumulated and we look at things with
reason; and hence guilt creeps in and we too creep into a bush or a convenient
Palm tree trunk or a thorny scrub- all this tamasu because i am
EDUCATED. Next someone says what's education got all to do with
peeing, give us a break. A person can pee if he is unlettered or even a MBA
qualified- its his existential RIGHT. True- a buffalo, cow, goat, why even a
Dog pee in open- they have a myriad reasons to do it- let me throw some gyan i
had acquired during my hours of viewing Discovery- Animal Planet- National
Geographic Channels
- Dog urinates for signalling his presence: maybe his territory or a new place to be claimed or even to attract or smell out a potential partner. Before i proceed further animals need not be classified on basis of sex because they are ANIMALS.
- Similarly simian monkeys- smallest of naturally occurring monkey's spray their urine over tree trunks and even on their lush coat to attract mates
- Cats of any variety in wild and domesticated signal above characteristics
- Cats especially Carnivores variety like Lion pees on a carcass or kill of another hunter just for the joy of indicating his smelly presence
- Similarly any other 4 legged living creature
- Buffalo or cow do not have any connotations while relieving oneself; i being a prospective farmer would always look at grabbing the dung balls for manure purpose- nature has made them that way
- Birds as you all know prefer 'anywhere anytime' bring it on attitude; many a times people avoid standing right under a ever scavenging crow to avoid getting pasted in God knows what all it had feasted on in its previous meal.
Yes the culprit is the MAN or MALE creation,
female due to many reasons few being dignity mostly abstain from publicly relieving
oneself. YES we can unequivocally conclude Men are shameless putting even
animals to shame. But a recent skimming through of various online news articles
point to a trend where women are not to be left behind. Working women, partying
women, boozing women and many other women have also taken to open urination
when hard pressed for locating a loos (stylised Anglican way to say a Toilet).
A recent news article talks about growing instances of women relieving in
public in city Chester.
Everyday 30 people are caught relieving in
public in Chester! God what about a city like Chennai.
I wondered why not India be rightly crowned 'TOILET NATION', its intolerance
cannot be more exemplified than by a news item on IBN Live, that a man in Delhi
was relieving in front of a private residence and when questioned he opened
fire? Height of absurdity? One cannot even defend his/ her right to
cleanliness, the man had the temerity to pick up a revolver and gun down the
citizen demanding him to zip up.
So this shows a man with money and muzzle can
shoot on walls and shoot down any protest. I have lived throughout my 33 years
in Chennai and not a 10 meter passes without me sniffing out a pungent nitrogen
smell.
Where do I get to sniff them Madras Corporation’s landmark large metal
dustbins.
What does Green MC dustbins mean, ‘hey man in
a hurry? Use behind me to let yourself free.’
·
Any bus terminal or bus
stop with a peripheral wall means OPEN FOR USE
·
Any large metal dustbins
with garbage strewn all over means OPEN FOR USE
·
Any TASMAC- ‘poor man’s
haven’ attached bar means attached OPEN TOILET; its entrance has a tippler in a
Lungi sprawling over the floor on his own puke and piss
·
Any street entrance or exit
which is convenient for a busy man to stop and relieve himself
·
Places of wealth where
privileged individuals reside in less frequented by a commoner is better off
because rarely a commoner ventures to this prohibited area; but even in such
locales a common toilet for their working staff is seriously missing; so they
end up on roads: but what’s the point is building toilets in such areas- public
amenities must be provided in places where it is absent
·
Yes any open playground
where kids play or even situated near to a slum clearance board tenement-
Hardly one gets to negotiate the playground no wonder football gets played
there
·
A railway station- stations
beside a cooum or a slum tenement or a newly converted garbage yard- Light
house station road, Mandaveli station connecting road, Greenways station road,
Villivakkam station road, Vysarpadi station road, none of suburban train
stations are left for walking; it’s a dedicated morning
RELIEVING HUMAN
STATIONS
- Cooum river decades ago was a navigable source now it’s a prime point for morning open ground for defecation
- Public toilets being converted into housing and storage places is a common sight; above all why would one risk entering a highly infectious smelly zone than finish the job behind a bush
- Next any open space be it a defunct water body or a Government notified land or thorny scrub bushes are all officially notified zones to open defecation- we can find pigs in the squalor and to accompany it disposable of meat refuse and all this becomes ideal place for human refuse.
- To top it all Government’s subsidized housing scheme- slum board in cities is a BIG JOKE- when these people are provided with concrete storied homes their essential sewerage connections are badly made and maintained you can find leaking pipes/ over flowing sewerage septic tanks and clogged lines- to add to all this the public convenience built is used all around it than INSIDE- places like Perambur Barracks Road slum/ Saravana Theater slum/ Nataraj Theater Choolai/ Pulianthope RTO/ Ganeshapuram area/ Vysarpadi Ambedkar College area and many more have all pavements lined with kids squatting for relieving- it’s not that they like to show their personal parts to public but helplessness and in-sensitiveness of the administration.
·
People would never like to
parade their dignity it’s their frustration and continued life in denial has
made them do such things.
·
It’s not uncommon to see
hordes of people lined up with trousers below their knees on Broad Gauge Tracks
of Indian Railways- why even Central and Egmore of not spared of the sight. Any
outsider stepping into Indian soil is all but struck by a revolting odour of
Human excreta and urine. How much more can this land be dumb to cleanliness.
Government Hospitals which
are supposedly places of hygiene next only to temples/ Mosques/ Churches/ Gurudwaras
is last to toilets- patients with little monitoring let their little ones
hushed up into a corner behind a medical director Maruti car. How can a
sensible mother let her 5 year old girl run about with her pants down in front
of alien eyes? Where has the dignity of one’s body gone? I feel it’s important
to impart children from small age
Place of worship apart from
the Sanctum Santorum and the main premises; the city itself is a trash haven,
no wonder Gods refuse to step out of their slumber
Good Tidings
ü Not everything is sordid and black in picture;
there occurred to villagers in Rajasthan to get around a shameless person
urinating with drums to make noise and embarrass in public about his actions.
ü Good habits classes undertaken in Government
schools by an NGO on usage of lavatories
ü Government school which has teachers contributing
in building a overhead tank for maintaining the toilets of their children
ü This mother was fined in US for allowing her child
to urinate in public- http://www.examiner.com/article/toddler-caught-urinating-public-mother-fined-2-500
ü A retired Municipal Magistrate Colonel (Retd) Arya
Vir was confronted by a fined person for urinating with a question, ‘where else
to relieve myself.’ Atleast there is a faint desire to use a loo provided one
is THERE. http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/specials/toilet/index26100601.shtml
The image to the left is Ecosan designed for minimal use of water and the human waste is collected separately in an air-tight chamber- after a year used a smell-free/ pathogen free soil manure, while urine is collected in the front pinhole kind of contraption. This was designed keeping in mind places where there is acute water shortage. SUPER............
ü Himachal Pradesh Gram Sabha meeting adopts
resolution to become ODF- Open Defecation Free state in March 2012. A clear
change of mind from India’s large rural population. It’s not known nearly a year since the resolution
has been passed what is the progress made? At least a start has been effected. http://www.indianexpress.com/news/hp-to-put-an-end-to-public-urination/928244/1
ü Jairam Ramesh, earlier Minister for Rural
Development was the first Union Minister to openly rake up the Open Defecation
Issue in Public; things done in public must be treated in Public- what an idea Sirji
ü
Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has made a start naming and shaming those
urinating in public, by photographing and video shooting those indulging in
this. http://www.ndtv.com/article/cities/road-wetters-photos-to-be-posted-online-in-bangalore-122092
ü Valsad District in Gujarat has a dedicated site
which proudly displays the sanitation work project- are our MLA’s and MP’s
watching this kind of development. http://valsaddp.gujarat.gov.in/valsad/english/shakhao/health-branch/maintenance_cleanliness.htm
What Can be Done-
v Instead of gifting Televisions/ Cycles/ Fans/ Wet
Grinders/ or anything which runs of power kindly gift them health through a
fully functional Toilet for a family of 4 and a bio waste compost structure if
possible- you are Gifting HEALTH to your electorate
v Instead of building monuments and memorials build toilets
with assured 24/7 water & electricity- this would curb the various ailments
affecting people
v Run a campaign to build a ODF Chennai City- today our
water bodies are used to clean our dirt which in turn is used to feed millions.
Ask political cadres to canvass to their electorate to STOP public inconvenience
by urinating/ defecating and spitting
v It’s a culture which we should inculcate- an Indian
obeying Singapore laws means he has not changed but he respects the system
which takes care of him and his needs
v Identify places like Bus Terminals/ Railway
stations/ Airports/ temples/ Churches/ Mosques/ Playgrounds/ Parks/ Malls as
designated places for people’s Restrooms. Chennai Semmoli Poonga’s restrooms
are well maintained try ways to increase the patronage as the road leading to Teynampet abutting Semmozhi Poonga stinks of Urine- the entire pavement is
dowsed in urine.
v A rule must be promulgated that TASMAC’s sold
products consumption must be in an enclosed place; open consumption is liable
for penal action- this avoids one slouched on the roads and eventually puking
and urinating in public. This applies only to Tamilnadu as its a state whose
welfare schemes are run by drowning millions of fools in alcohol’s money.
- Railways must invest in technology and resources to stop human waste being dump on tracks as its THE biggest Dumper of SHIT on more than 50,000 Kms of tracks. Hopefully people will stop squatting on tracks early in the mornings find no more shit on the tracks. Simple psychology you see. Just presume a tourist alien to India visits and finds nothing more than shit to smell. Indian Railways are our brand ambassador to outside world. One smells a country; not smirk at the thought of India.
Great it takes a courage of a man like Narendra Modi to announce Swacch Bharat Abhiyan............hats off to this Leader who has shown the way. Many people rarely raise this subject as it stinks..........http://www.narendramodi.in/pm-launches-swachh-bharat-abhiyaan/
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