San-Sadhan Hackathon: Divyang Accessible Toilets

• 23 Aug 2019

The government has invited applications for its latest initiative under the Swachh Bharat Mission, called the ‘San-Sadhan’ Hackathon,

• The initiative aims to ease lives of Divyangjan by making toilets smarter, more accessible, and easier to use.
• It is being jointly Organized by :
  
  • Ministry of Jal Shakti
  • Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities
  • Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog
  • Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
  • 91springboard.
• The Objective of San-Sadhan Hackathon are:
  
  • Affordable, compact, flexible to use & design and scalability to suit variable area requirements.
  • Demands of different disabilities, geographies, age groups, genders and cultures have to be kept in mind.
  • Specifically, issues of wheelchair users, amputees, visually impaired and conditionally disabled (person with fracture, pregnant women, lactating mothers, elderlies etc.) need to be addressed.
• The solution could be developed for any one of the following categories:
  
  • Rural Individual Use Toilet
  • Rural Community Use Toilet
  • Urban Individual Use Toilet
  • Urban Community Use Toilet
• As per the 2011 census, 2.68 crore people in the country fall under the category of ‘Divyangs’.

Swachh Bharat Abhiyan

• The Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (SBA) or Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM) was launched on October 2, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi in 2014.
• It aims to clean up the streets, roads and infrastructure of India’s cities, towns, and rural areas and achieve an open-defecation free India by October 2, 2019, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.
• Also aims to build 90 million rural toilets in the country.
• Further, the mission will also help India meet the Sustainable Development Goal-6 (SDG 6), as established by the UN in 2015.

Other Initiatives Related to Divyangjan

• Recently, the second "Disability Summit, 2019" took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina with the hope of achieving real change for people with disabilities.
• The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) is a comprehensive human rights convention and international development tool and is at the heart of the disability rights movement.
• India had enacted the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016.
• The international day of persons with disabilities is observed every year on 3^rd December.
• Recently the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment organised Regional Conference on “Deendayal Disabled Rehabilitation Scheme (DDRS)” in Mumbai.
• The Election Commission of India (ECI) had launched Accessible Elections initiative in Lok Sabha Election-2019 to make the election process more participative and inclusive.
• Recently, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment entered into Guinness Book of World Records for implanting ‘Modern Artificial Limbs (Legs)’ on 260 Divyangjans within eight hours.

Source: PIB