The first eco-friendly public toilet, made of stubble waste and crop residue, is now established in Rajinder Nagar with the help of Hansraj College under Enactus.
Owing to the rising pollution level in the city, the ‘Project Vriddhi’ at Hansraj College under Enactus aims to reduce stubble burning by putting it into four beneficial uses – mushroom cultivation, handicrafts and other utility items, construction of washrooms and biogas generation.
The latest report by the World Health Organisation and the United Nations Children’s Fund states that around 22% of the rural population in India lacks access to basic sanitation facilities like toilets.
Moreover, despite having access to washrooms, numerous households refuse to change their sanitary behaviours. As a result, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) proposed the Nirmaan project, in which 800 kgs of crop residue was compressed to build a single toilet.
In 2019, the party built a washroom in a small slum in Uttar Pradesh that serves over 150 families. To curb the pollution level in the city, the Delhi government took an initiative to mitigate stubble burning by developing a bio-decomposer by PUSA.
Last year, the government also supplied free bio-decomposers, which were used by farmers to transform stubble into manure on 1935 acres of land in 39 villages.
In collaboration with the Enactus, members of Hansraj College, the government was able to install an eco-friendly toilet in a short duration. Installing an eco-friendly toilet made from stubble waste in Rajinder Nagar will also serve a large number of regular passers-by as well as the general public.
An advisor to Rajinder Nagar MLA Raghav Chadha, Abhishek Bhattacharya, told The Daily Guardian: “At Raghav Chadha’s Office, we have been focusing extensively on creating sustainable and environment-friendly developments through various initiatives. This toilet is among many of those initiatives. It was in great demand and we are happy to fulfil.”