Das, Pranati

Odisha (an eastern Indian state) prioritizes water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) for all. Besides creating adequate infrastructure, Odisha is ensuring the last mile service delivery through a decentralized community -led WASH management in the cities. This instills community stewardship while leveraging the local resources and skills.

Around 23% of Odisha’s urban families (1.56 m people) live in slums (Census, 2011), are engaged in informal daily wage job like sanitation work, rag picking, construction labor, etc. With low levels of education and skills, they struggle accessing opportunities in urban areas. Absence of identity and address papers deprive them of state’s social security benefits.

India’s 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, 1992, and National Urban Livelihood Mission, 2013 mandate the Urban Local Bodies to address vulnerabilities of urban poor through grassroots institution building, skilling and engaging them in livelihoods.

Odisha has engaged a woman cadre called Jalasathis (Water-Friends) in 2019, who are WSHG members, for managing public awareness, water tax collection, and resolving on-the-ground issues of water supply. Similarly, based on the DAY-NULM and SBM Convergence Guidelines, 2018, Odisha has pioneered the decentralised community partnership model in Solid Waste Management (SWM).
More than 5000 women members from sanitation worker, waste picker and trans-women SHGs are spearheading the SWM value chain – ensuring citizen’s behaviour change, collection and processing of segregated waste.

Odisha has established a training - learning ecosystem with tech-support from Urban Management Centre, a not-for-profit. WSHG friendly modules on their roles and responsibilities, digital literacy, financial literacy, communication skills have been developed and they have been trained.

Overall, 6000 plus WSHG members are managing WASH in Odisha. These women earn a decent income of 15000 INR per month and can access social security entitlements. Women’s status has increased within family and the community; they have gained voice and agency besides their economic empowerment.

Around 23% of an eastern Indian state, Odisha’s urban families (1.56 m people) squat in slums (Census, 2011). Tenure insecurity coupled with migrant status and absence of identity and address papers deprive them accessing their legitimate entitlements. While these slum dwellers help run the city life as street-vendors, house-helps, drivers, plumbers, sanitation workers, daily-wagers, they themselves struggle for shelter, secured livelihood and basic amenities.

With community stewardship of the Slum-Dwellers Association (SDAs) with 50% women members and the women Self-Help Groups (WSHGs), Odisha, has successfully formalised the land rights of the slum-dwellers under The Odisha Land Rights to Slum Dwellers Act, 2017 through a participatory process. Joint titles, in the name of both spouses of the slum-dwellers, have been issued to the land under their possession measuring up to 30 sqm free of cost for residential use in the Urban local Bodies (ULBs). The land titling empowers the slum dwellers with heritable and mortgageable rights over the land for which titles. Land titles are also issued for area beyond 30 sqm. up to 45 sqm. in medium ULBs and 60 sqm. in smaller ULBs on payment by the occupant.

Post titling, these community-based collectives - SDAs and WSHGs - have engaged in economic activities under the Mukhya Mantri Karma Tatpara Abhiyan (MUKTA), 2021 (previously UWEI) that mandates to construct basic public amenity projects both in slum and non-slum areas in partnership with SDAs and WSHGs as the “community partners”. These community stewards have constructed 1016 public gyms, 824 mini parks, 724 child play station and 156 KM paver-block walking tracks in 115 ULBs of Odisha.

Once marginalised and subdued, these women are now economically empowered by executing projects of more than 10 billion INR and have earned 7.5% of the project cost as their supervision charges.