-The Economic Times   NEW DELHI: The new NDA government under Narendra Modi is set to embark on an ambitious multi-million dollar sanitation project that seeks to clean up around 1,000 Indian towns besides eliminating manual scavenging as a tribute to Mahatma Gandhi whose 150th birth anniversary will be celebrated in 2019. Tentatively named the 'Mahatma Gandhi Clean India Programme', the project will start from three cities in Uttar Pradesh, including Modi's Lok...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Days before the new government will take the charge at Centre, a high-level task force, headed by the planning commission member K Kasturirangan, has submitted its report highlighting the ways and means to convert municipal waste into energy and pitched for involving private players in a big way for achieving the goal of sustainable waste management in the country. The report - Waste to Energy -...

-Economic and Political Weekly   Open defecation is a major health hazard and causes enormous hardship, especially to rural women. Government funds for constructing toilets have to be supplemented with awareness campaigns to motivate ordinary people to do their part. Sarola, a village in Maharashtra, was able to become "open defecation free" with effective community participation, taking advantage of the Sant Gadgebaba Gram Swachhata Abhiyan. Toilets were built in every house, along...

-PTI WASHINGTON: A revolutionary waterless toilet powered by the sun, developed to help some of the 2.5 billion people lacking safe and sustainable sanitation around the world, will be unveiled in India this month. Designed and built using a $7,77,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the self-contained, waterless toilet with its innovative technology converts human waste to biochar, a highly porous charcoal. It aims to provide an eco-friendly solution to...

-The World Bank About 7.8 million rural people are expected to directly benefit from the project NEW DELHI: The government of India and the World Bank today signed a $500 million credit agreement to improve piped water supply and sanitation services through decentralized delivery systems in the states of Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh. The credit agreement for the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation (RWSS) Project for Low Income States was signed...