India's School Sanitation Crisis

Don’t be surprised to hear

that schools in India are in

worse condition than those

in Nigeria and Ethiopia.

I’m not saying this, the WHO and UNICEF reports are.

According to them, in 2025,

nearly fifty million children in India, or

five crore children,

didn’t have basic sanitation services at school.

These figures are even higher than those

for countries like Nigeria and Ethiopia.

Basic sanitation doesn’t

just mean having toilets,

it’s determined by various

criteria. UNICEF determines it based on whether schools have

single- sex toilets that are

available and usable. In India’s

schools, sanitation isn’t

the only thing lacking.

According to the report,

twenty million children, or two crore,

also didn’t have basic hygiene services.

These include clean water,

a place to wash hands, and hand

They also check whether there's

soap and detergent for washing, and

about 12 million children didn't have drinking water facilities

either. You can understand from this how bad

the situation is. Globally, only 78 percent of schools had basic

drinking water, 77 percent had sanitation, and

72 percent had

hygiene services.

Now think about this:

we also have SDG goals, namely

the Sustainable Development Goals.

SDG Four aims to ensure inclusive

and quality education by 2030. Meanwhile,

SDG Six commits to clean water,

sanitation, and hygiene

for everyone. But the question isn't

just about children getting to school,

it's also about providing them with a

safe and hygienic learning environment.

So, without these basic facilities,

can we reach 2030

Will they achieve their SDG goals by 2025,

including targets for quality education and sanitation

achieve

by then? This gives you an idea of how

challenging even the basics remain

for developing countries, and how far the state,

which is responsible

for fixing these things,

still has to go. What do you

think about this?

Be sure to share your opinion in the comments.