In Kokkarapati village (TN), dilapidated public toilets cause difficulty, disease and humiliation.
Although the level of investment has increased in the last decade, India is still lagging behind in its sanitation facilities. It was estimated in 2008 that more than 638 million Indians had no access to a toilet, and were forced to use fields or roadsides. Only 21% of the rural areas had proper public sanitation facilities.
Often, the lack of monitoring and the negligence of local politicians undermine the quality of projects that could have significantly improved the lives of local inhabitants. Indeed, the institutions in charge of operating and maintaining the infrastructure are often weak, lacking funding, or plagued by graft.