Half of the 550000 villages in India have no toilet facilities for women. They have to perform the task in open fields and that is possible only pre-dawn and post-dusk. Village roads run between the fields and the hapless women including young girls have to defecate close to the edge of the roads for fear of abduction or molestation which frequently is the case anyhow. When vehicles run along these roads in the dark, their headlights alert these girls who then, half-done with their toilet activity, are forced to stand up to hide their shame. I am sadly reminded of the plight of Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi who underwent a like physical trauma at Dakshineshwar where she had to get through her daily proceedings at 3 a.m. and then after dusk when the temple precincts would be empty. This prolonged wait to get the opportunity to respond to Nature's call led in later life to her suffering from agonising colic pain. This is just an instance, and a very potent one too, for the Central Government to take cognisance of and thereon adopt effective measures to address the problem. The Hindu tradition holds woman in the highest esteem and beholds her as the embodiment of the Divine Mother. Here we see how both the Divine Mother Sri Sarada Devi and her children have been subjected to inhuman conditions of sanitation and even after 69 years of independence the situation is so appalling. Are we a civilised nation when we allow such indignity to be heaped on our women who are our mothers, our sisters, our daughters? It is time to redress the situation, else we should hide our faces in shame instead of vaunting as a global economic power for the size of the economy does not determine the character of a nation so much as the living quality of its inhabitants. India, arise and act.
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