Pro poor accountability in Watsan at Ahmedabad, India

Traditionally, provision of water and sanitation at the household level to slum residents was not seen as a priority by ULBs: the mechanisms for obtaining such services were typically absent. The vacuum was filled by middlemen, who charged huge amounts for sub-standard services. In Ahmedabad City, India, the ULB, slum residents and NGOs have developed an innovative system to bring accountability and reduced corruption to the provision of watsan services. The mainstay of the system is charging affordable user fees, this ensures that the users – slum residents – have leverage to ensure quality in the installation and maintenance of services. The paper starts by describing the traditional approach to the provision of water and sanitation before presenting the innovation. Pro-poor accountability arrangements are then listed. Three examples follow that show what happened when the innovation was put into practice; the first is of a slum, the second of a middleman and the third of a resident.