4. In which ways is the initiative creative and innovative?
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The Swachh Bharat Mission is an initiative of GoI; every state is building toilets. The Government of Andhra Pradesh, through the SAC, is providing more funding than other states; nevertheless, this is primarily a financial matter.
What Andhra Pradesh has done to distinguish its program is create an unparalleled degree of transparency and accountability. Money flows to beneficiaries’ bank accounts (verified by their Aadhar Card – a biometric national ID), and recipient information is publicly available. These beneficiaries, either individually or through their local SHF or SLF, arrange for construction themselves rather than through government.
Before any money is dispersed, a geo-tagged photograph of the site (with longitude and latitude) is publicly uploaded, and at each stage when subsidies are dispersed, a geo-tagged photograph is uploaded to display that work that has been completed. Similar procedures are followed for community, school, and public toilets – every citizen can see exactly how their tax rupees are being spent. Moreover, these infrastructure efforts are paired with household-targeted IEC activities to ensure that toilets are not only built, but used. The Swachh Andhra Corporation realized that increased funding means little without transparency and accountability; the combination, however, can result in vastly improved public service delivery.
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5. Who implemented the initiative and what is the size of the population affected by this initiative?
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The initiative was implemented by a coalition of groups. The Swachh Andhra Corporation led statewide coordination and planning, designed the architecture of the scheme, and was responsible for the disbursement of funds, while individual municipal authorities were responsible for the geo-tagging and verification of beneficiaries. In some cases, local Self-Help Groups (community organizations in low-income areas) took responsibility for constructing communal or household toilets; in most cases, citizens themselves were responsible for arranging the construction by local masons and builders.
In terms of size, the initiative covered every urban municipality over the thirteen districts of Andhra Pradesh, an area of 163,000 km2 with an urban population of 14,610, 410 (2011 Census). Over 173,000 individual household toilets were constructed, as well as 759 community toilet facilities (total of 7,748 toilet seats – 3073 for men and 4675 for women), 489 public toilet facilities (4,758 seats – 2524 for men and 2234 for women), and 1,256 school toilet facilities. Accounting for an average household size of five and a user ratio (specified by GoI) of 1 seat per 30 individuals for group facilities, the number of users for individual, community, public, and school toilets, significantly over one million people have benefited from the initiative.
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6. How was the strategy implemented and what resources were mobilized?
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Coordinating the construction and funding of tens of thousands of toilets across one hundred and ten municipalities required considerable coordination between municipal and state officials. However, before citizens applied for subsidies through Swachh Andhra, they needed to be both informed of the subsidies’ existence and also provided with details of how to apply for the subsidies.
This process was led by municipalities, who informed citizens of existence of the program by notifying community groups, particularly Self Help Groups (SHG) and Slum Level Federations (SLF), working through municipal ward councilors (local elected officials), or utilizing public advertisements. Once a citizen applied for the subsidy, verification of their eligibility (not having a toilet already, and living in the residence) would be conducted by an Assistant Executive Engineer (AEE) or members of the local SLF. At this point, citizens would verify their identity and bank account via their Aadhar Card (a national biometric ID). During this process, a geo-tagged photograph displaying the premises on which the toilet was to be built would be uploaded onto SAC’s publicly accessible database.
Once the beneficiary’s identity, location, and eligibility were verified, they would be instructed to begin construction. Subsides were given out in three stages. Once a beneficiary had completed the below-ground work (either a twin-pit or a septic tank), an AEE would verify the work, upload a geo-tagged photograph, and the first payment (INR 5,000) would be sent directly to the beneficiary’s bank account. The beneficiaries followed a similar process for the next two stages: the second payment would be disbursed after a photograph displaying a completed super-structure was uploaded, and final payments were sent after a geo-tagged picture of the complete structure was uploaded. All of these photographs and the attached geographic information are publicly available on SAC’s online database (http://sac.ap.gov.in/sac/UserInterface/Application/NewReportsBS/StateReportBS.aspx).
For every individual toilet, ₹11,000 was provided by GoAP, and ₹4,000 was provided by GoI through SBM. The Swachh Andhra Corporation’s internal operations are funded by the Government of Andhra Pradesh. Municipalities assisting with the verification and validation on-ground are funded by their own independent dedicated revenue streams (predominantly state/central grants and property taxation).
The process for building community and public toilet facilities differed significantly from the process of supporting the construction of household toilets, and also from each other. Community toilets are primarily built for communities where the construction of IHHTs is impractical due to space constraints; public toilets are generally built near markets or transit hubs – locations away from home where groups of people spend considerable amounts of time.
In each case, individual municipalities assessed the neighborhoods and public sites to determine the need for communal or public facilities. For community toilets, this process included field surveys identifying and enumerating all families who lived in the vicinity in order to establish the user base for the community toilet. If it was decided that a community toilet was needed, municipalities would begin campaigns through the local SLF to sensitize local residents on the importance of using proper toilets before the new facility was completed.
Management and maintenance of public and community toilets would then be arranged either through local civic groups (SHGs, SLFs), or in partnership with one of the eleven empaneled operators (who collect money through user fees in order to maintain and operate the facilities).
These public and community toilets cost ₹98,000 per seat; the Government of Andhra Pradesh pays ₹58,800, while the Government of India contributes ₹39,200. The costs for these toilets are considerably higher than those for individual households as they require significantly more land, a larger physical structure, and more comprehensive containment infrastructure for septage and sewage.
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7. Who were the stakeholders involved in the design of the initiative and in its implementation?
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Eliminating open defecation in urban Andhra Pradesh required the coordination of officials throughout the state and national government. The national government, through the Swachh Bharat Mission and the Ministry of Urban Development, established the basic framework, provided technical guidelines, and provided partial funding. However, their role was limited with regards to statewide implementation.
The Swachh Andhra Corporation was founded in May 2015 by Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu, who sits as the Chairman of the Board of Swachh Andhra Mission. The SAC is under the direct oversight of Dr. P. Narayana, Minister for Administration and Urban Development, and is led by Managing Director D. Muralidhar Reddy, IAS. Additionally, many ministers sit on the board of the Swachh Andhra Mission and SAC coordinates closely in its endeavors particularly closely with the Panchayat Raj Ministry, the Finance Ministry, and the Human Resource Development.
The Swachh Andhra Corporation works through the 110 urban local bodies, each of which is led by a Council Chair, who acts as the political leader of the municipality, and a Commissioner, who functions as the administrative leader. Within municipalities, authorities work with local Self Help Groups and Slum Level Federations to identify potential beneficiaries, construct individual toilets, identify sites for communal/public toilets, and persuade citizens of the importance of proper toilet usage, cleanliness, and sanitation.
Working together, and coordinated by the Swachh Andhra Corporation, these stakeholders have succeeded in eliminating open defecation throughout urban Andhra Pradesh.
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8. What were the most successful outputs and why was the initiative effective?
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The Quality Council of India, conducting a third-party assessment have announced that open defecation in Urban Andhra Pradesh has been eliminated. This is by far the most successful output: as of the most 2011 census, over fifteen percent of urban families habitually defecated openly – this number has now been reduced to approximately zero. The cause of these efforts was the construction of over 170,000 individual household toilets, 758 communal toilet facilities, 486 public toilet facilities, and 1,247 school toilet facilities. Moreover, each toilet and facility’s location and presence can be verified by any interested citizen, facilitating transparency and ensuring accountability.
This transparency and accountability was one of the biggest factors ensuring the initiative’s success and effectiveness; similar efforts in India to subsidize public goods for poor and disadvantaged citizens often floundered (and still face difficulties) in implementation due to extensive “leakage” along the value and supply chain. By verifying citizens’ identification through Aadhar cards and then disbursing money directly into bank accounts, such “leakage” was eliminated.
However, the number of toilets constructed is not the only story – open defecation has only been eliminated due to the combination of infrastructure development and public campaigning against open defecation. The Swachh Andhra Corporation has conducted an extensive behavioral change campaign, both working with grassroots organizations and promoting sanitation through radio advertisements, billboards, posters on buses/trains, school events, plays, workshops, and other media all over the state. Often, these larger-scale advertisements were located at known Open Defecation hotspots, as part of a targeted campaign to reach those most likely to openly defecate. In fact, all ULBs were responsible for mapping out individual OD hotspots in order to conduct individual and household-level interactions focusing on persuading individuals to cease openly defecating. The larger-scale campaign was subject to an extensive internally-conducted evaluation which surveyed over 17,000 citizens across Andhra Pradesh to solicit their opinions on tactics and specific advertisements in order to strengthen the campaign.
These grassroots efforts have been complimented by an online infrastructure utilizing the Swachh Andhra Corporation’s mobile app, called the “Swachh App,” which not only locates and displays all public, community, and school toilet, but enables citizens to take their own pictures of the toilets and send them to the SAC as a feedback mechanism. This citizen feedback mechanism ensures that ULBs and service providers remain accountable for maintaining safe, dignified, and hygienic toilet facilities for all citizens.
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9. What were the main obstacles encountered and how were they overcome?
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The Swachh Andhra Corporation’s campaign against open defecation faced two sets of obstacles. The first set was technical: for example, flush toilets with attached twin pits or septic tanks could not be easily constructed everywhere. In some areas, soil or topographical conditions did not permit individuals to build their own containment units. Particularly in hilly and rocky areas, where the digging of pits becomes difficult, topographic conditions made building individual containment units difficult. In response, the SAC modified the standard plans, and sponsored systems whereby ten to twelve households would be linked to a common larger septic tank via a gravity-flow drainage system.
Along similar lines, SAC faced difficulties in training municipal staff how to use the online database: many had never facilitated approvals via digital signatures or approved significant financial expenses via a website or mobile-phone app. This adaptation took considerable time and SAC invested significant time and resources into visiting municipalities over the state to conduct training programs and workshops to ensure that every ULB could actively participate in the initiative.
The second set of obstacles was broader in scope: people don’t change their habits overnight, and building toilets doesn’t immediately result in usage. Commonly, after a toilet is built, it is used by women and children, but men would still prefer to defecate openly as they were accustomed to. This challenge is still being met by SAC’s IEBC (Information, Education, and Behavioral Change) work; while open defecation has been vastly reduced in urban Andhra Pradesh via concerted campaigns, slippage – a return of open defecation – is still possible without continued behavioral change campaigns.
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