-The Indian Express Warning that time was running out to preserve the Ganga, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today pulled up state governments for a tardy performance on sewage treatment and asked them to take action against industries polluting the river. Voicing concern over the discharge of 2,900 million litres of sewage in the Ganga every day, Singh asked state governments to send proposals for new sewage treatment plants and said adequate funding...

Deadline to be fixed for conversion of insanitary latrines Employing people for manual scavenging and cleaning of septic tanks and sewers will attract a hefty penalty once the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Bill, 2012 is passed. The Bill that seeks to prohibit employment as sanitary workers is to be tabled in Parliament in the monsoon session. The proposed law suggests that every insanitary latrine will have to...

Each time 25 year old Salma takes her one year old son Zubair to the Batla Clinic (a private clinic in Delhi) for a shot of the DPT, the cost of transportation and the vaccine adds up to approximately Rs.500.   When it is time for Zubair to take the next immunization dose, Salma may find that the expenses have entirely spiraled out of her reach. New vaccines and expensive brands of baby...

The Centre on Friday informed the Supreme Court that appropriate steps would soon be taken to amend the Employment of Manual Scavengers and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act, 1993 to eliminate manual scavenging. Additional Solicitor General Harin Raval told a Bench of Justices H.L. Dattu and C.K. Prasad that necessary amendments would be introduced in the monsoon session of Parliament. The ASG also assured the court that the government would...

-The Business Standard Moving forward on sanitation will require big ideas National shame” is how most people, including some senior government functionaries, often refer to the pervasive practice of open defecation. Yet, the Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC), launched in 1991 with the noble objective of providing access to hygienic toilets for all by 2012, receives only scant attention from the government. The latest assessment indicates that as many as 22 states will...