Simplified sewerage: an appropriate option for rapid coverage in peri-urban areas of India

With increasing population pressure in the cities and towns across India, clearing the backlog, and improving and maintaining sanitation service levels has become increasingly challenging. Water borne human excreta disposal through conventional sewerage system is expensive and increasingly infeasible for congested, small plot habitations which experience low or declining service levels of water supply. Although this represents the higher order technology option, it is increasingly being questioned because of its water intensive feature. In areas where onsite sanitation is technically not feasible and where conventional sewerage is financially unaffordable, simplified sewerage as an intermediate technology solution offers an appropriate option. Successful experience of over 20 years in Latin American countries has positioned this technology as an important and only feasible option for periurban areas and low income settlements. A small municipality of Ramagundam (Andhra Pradesh, India) with a population of around 250,000 has successfully adopted this technology and has been able to provide full sanitation in 13 lowand middleincome communities covering over 6600 households. Lessons from this success story could be drawn for wider application and rapid coverage under the ongoing infrastructure strengthening programs. There is a need to evolve appropriate policy and technical guidelines such that the sanitary engineering community can confidently adopt this unconventional technology and extend the benefits of improved sanitary conditions and better public health to a larger population.