Building a toilet and using a toilet are different problems, and only one of them can be procured.
A village survey recorded 596 households in Tikaria. Fifty-eight had toilets and, by the report’s count, forty-three families were using them. Women and girls waited for early morning or after dark to find privacy outside. Households were exposed to weather, animals and contamination.
The work started from the premise that a toilet programme needs infrastructure and an informed household decision, and that the second cannot be assumed. Sanitation was discussed through self-help-group meetings, parent meetings, Village Health and Nutrition Days, household visits and videos.
These were not publicity events. They were settings in which a family could raise what it actually worried about: cost, water, design, maintenance, and whether the thing would still work in three years.
The model combined government support of ₹9,000 per toilet at the time, a household contribution of ₹900, and additional material support valued at ₹5,000 covering doors, plastering, tiles, pit covers, whitewashing and painting. The design used twin soak pits and a low-water rural pan.
DEHAT facilitated the engagement, the capacity building, the coordination and attention to construction quality. Families decided to take part, contributed to building and took up use. The Gram Panchayat and the government programme carried their public responsibilities; ACC Tikaria provided the supplementary materials.
The record holds two dated stages: 110 toilets supported at one point, benefiting 495 people, and 346 toilets constructed with ACC assistance by the later summary. A World Toilet Day rally brought toilet users and schoolchildren together.
Rajkali, a resident, described the change in terms of privacy, fear, and the fact that everyone in the family could now use a toilet at home. That is why the count of structures was never the point.
Fifty-eight households had toilets. Forty-three were using them.
The Conversation Is the Intervention
Sanitation that lasts is decided in meetings about water, cost and maintenance before anything is built.