We desperately need to battle India’s dismal conditions of sanitation if children are to be nourished, and human beings are to live in habitats which are dignified, healthy and safe. But none of these problems can be solved by pious pledges by middle-class people to keep their surroundings clean. Cleanliness is often a luxury of people of relative privilege. Cleaning India requires dismantling the deadweight of India’s inequalities, and of our tolerance of social humiliation and the governmental neglect of women, people of disadvantaged castes and religions, and of working people in slums. Until that happens, we would evoke Gandhi’s name in vain by depoliticising one of India’s most deeply political problems, perpetuated by powerlessness and neglect of India’s millions of lesser lives.
Posted on: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 10:15:04 +0000
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