Agents Of Change

Social welfare schemes have had a positive impact on the lives of those in rural India, but a lot still needs to be done

- Naini Thaker

In the nondescript village of Moondiya Kalan, 60 km away from Jaipur, Rajasthan, the sound of a dhol wasn’t a cause of celebration. Instead, it was an unusual way to embarrass people defecating in the open. The move seems to have worked. Almost 90 percent of the 221 families in the village have built a toilet inside their homes. This comes in the wake of the NDA government pushing its pet project, Swachh Bharat Mission, which promotes cleanliness and sanitation. Social welfare schemes such as the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana and Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana among others have brought about a positive change in the lives of people in rural India in particular. Using Moondiya—located in the Todaraisingh sub-district of Tonk—as a test case, Forbes India assesses their impact.

SWACHH BHARAT MISSION

As part of the scheme launched in 2014, each of the 221 families got 12,000 via direct transfers in their bank accounts to build toilets in their homes. The panchayat worked with officers of the mission to ensure there are 2-3 public toilets in the village. “It has been three years since we have a toilet inside the house. Prior to that, I would go to the fields near the jungle early morning or late at night. If someone came there, I would have to get up. Also, I would catch infections early,” says Nirmala Jahangir, a housewife with three children.

Humiliating people with dhols helped. “We needed to find the right way to change mindsets. No matter how many times we talked to them, nothing worked. We had to come up with an innovative way. So if we saw an individual going to the fields, we would embarrass them by playing the dhol and creating a scene… eventually they would have to use a toilet,” says Damodar Bairwa, district project coordinator, Swachh Bharat Mission.