Pune: Plan for women’s toilets on highways still on paper

PUNE: When Seema Devaskar was travelling by road with her family to Karnataka, she could hardly find toilets along the highway. They had to stop at food plazas and these too were ill-maintained.

The government has declared rural and urban areas as open defecation free but toilets for women along the highways remains on paper.

“On the one hand, the government has been advocating the success of Swacch Bharat Abhiyan and on the other hand the toilets for women along the highways is absent,’’ Devaskar said.

Her friend and frequent traveller Medha Kaushik also had the same experience. “What is available is bad. It is the last thing the authorities monitoring the highways are bothered about,’’ she added.

Last year, the Public Works Department minister Chandrakant Patil had announced that 160 spots along the highways would be identified by the department. These would be geo-tagged for travellers to locate the spots.

However, even after a year, work is at a snails pace.

Mumtaz Sheikh from the Right to Pee movement, who has been following up with the state government and highway authorities on these issues, said they have travelled along the highways to find that there are hardly any toilets that can be used by women except at food plazas.

“The one or two which the government is claiming are operational is hardly maintained and unfit for use,’’ Sheikh said.

The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan that has percolated to some extent on the streets of urban and in rural India seems to have had no effect on the construction of toilets along the highways

“If the government wanted to avoid open defecation on highways and provide relief to women commuters, work should have been completed by now,’’ Simran Ahulwalia, another frequent traveller, said. PWD officials said they have identified spots at a distance of 75 to 85 km and toilet constructions are on.

‘They should be completed by the end of 2019,’’ a senior official said.

Construction of toilets has started at Lonavla, Katraj ghat, Khed Shivapur and near Velhe and along the Ashtavinayak darshan routes and these will be geo-tagged.

Sheikh said they have been demanding toilets at a distance of 20-25km instead of 80-85km.

“The PWD has cited water and land issues for constructing these toilets. We have suggested that locals help in construction or have a toilet on public-private partnership,’’Sheikh added.