Kolkata Municipal Corporation plans women's restrooms with changing & nursing spaces

KOLKATA: The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) is planning to set up at least one public restroom in each of the city's 144 wards exclusively for women with changing and nursing spaces, apart from ramps for easier accessibility for those with mobility issues.
Sources said the restrooms, aimed at working women and shoppers, would be set up as part of a larger plan by the corporation to overhaul the city's pay-and-use toilets.
A civic official said the new restrooms wouldn't be "ordinary". If space permits, the toilets would also have bathing-cum-changing rooms, feeding rooms and a kids' zone.
And each of these restrooms would have round-the-clock women guards.
The civic authorities said the project was adopted after receiving feedback from women who regularly step out of home. Many of them said most of the pay-and-use toilets were ill-maintained and unhygienic, apart from being insecure, as they were adjacent to men's washrooms.
"The women's special toilets, guarded by women, will ensure safety and attract more women," said an official of KMC's slum development department, who has been entrusted to find land for the toilets.
Most women TOI spoke to welcomed the KMC's decision, but said due care must be taken to keep them hygienic and maintain them.
'Good effort by KMC but toilets should be spic and span'
Most women that TOI spoke to welcomed the Kolkata Municipal Corporation's plans to build women-only toilets in each of the city's 144 wards.
A 25-year-old resident of Salt Lake, who has a sales job in central Kolkata, said it was difficult to find a clean women's-only restroom in the area. "It's a great initiative by KMC, but due care should be taken to properly maintain these spaces," she said.
Another woman, a south Kolkata resident who loves to go shopping with her one-year-old son in Gariahat, said the changing and nursing spaces in these planned restrooms would be of great help. "But the restrooms should be kept spic and span, in order to make them a viable option for women with young kids," she said.
Mayoral council member Swapan Samaddar said all 144 councillors had been asked to identify convenient plots in their wards. "Councillors of around 35 wards have earmarked space. We have made a sketch of the toilets' design and started consulting experts before floating a construction tender. The search for land is on, as we need to build these toilets as fast as possible," Samaddar said.
A KMC official said that the civic body was focusing on land in the city's central business district (CBD) area and in major shopping destinations. "A survey on working women and shoppers has revealed that several places in the CBD and shopping zones lack proper toilets," said a senior KMC official.
"We are concentrating on areas like BBD Bag, Burrabazar, Esplanade, Ganesh Chandra Avenue, Camac Street, Russell Street, Park Circus, Gariahat, Lake Market and Anwar Shah Road to set up these women-only toilets."