Dr. Bindeshwar. Pathak is the founder of the Sulabh International Social Service Organization. Dr. Pathak is known around the world for his wide ranging work in the sanitation field to improve public health, advance social progress, and improve human rights in India and other countries. His accomplishments are felt in the fields of sanitation technology, social enterprise, and healthcare education for millions of people in his native country, serving as a model for NGO agencies and public health initiatives around the world.
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Dr Pathak formed “Sulabh” the Sanitation Movement in 1970. Dr. Pathak has worked to change social attitudes toward traditional unsanitary latrine practices in slums, rural villages, and dense urban districts, and developed cost effective toilet systems that have improved daily life and health for millions of people. He has also launched an ongoing campaign to abolish the traditional practice of manual scavenging of human waste from bucket latrines in India while championing the rights of former scavengers and their families to economic opportunity, decent standards of living, and social dignity.
Early Childhood, Young Life and Career
Dr Pathak was born to a Brahmin family in 1943 and raised in the Indian state of Bihar. He attended Patna University where he earned an M.A. in Sociology, an M.A. in English, a Ph.D. for his research on “Liberation of scavengers through low cost sanitation” and a Doctorate of Literature for “Eradication of scavenging and environmental sanitation in India: a sociological study.”
Frequently citing the common toilet as one of civilization’s most significant advances, Dr. Pathak has led the development of cost-effective and culturally appropriate toilets and related treatment systems to replace the traditional unsanitary bucket latrines in poor communities throughout India.
The Sulabh Shauchalaya twin pit and pour-flush toilet system is now in use in for more than 1.2 million residences and buildings built by Sulabh. This technology has been declared a Global Best Practice by United Nations HABITAT and Centre for Human Settlements, and is now recommended by the UNDP for use by more than 2.6 billion people around the world.
Sulabh public toilet and bath facilities are located at 7500 locations, together serving more than 10 million people on a daily basis. These pay-per-use public facilities provide an economically sustainable, ecological, and culturally acceptable solution to hygiene problems in crowded slum communities and public places. Several technologies are used to convert waste from Sulabh Shauchalaya toilets into biogas for heating, cooking, and generating electricity.
Involvement as a Sociologist
Dr. Pathak has worked on the leading edge of social enterprise for decades, combining business best practices and principled activism promoting the causes of better sanitation, societal change, and improved quality of life. His early concern for the plight of the so called “untouchable” scavenger caste led to the development of the Sulabh Shauchalaya toilets to eliminate the need for manual scavenging by poor communities. Over the years he has led multiple initiatives to champion social dignity, economic justice, and liberation from the caste-oriented system for scavengers and their families.
In 1970, he founded the Sulabh International Social Service Organisation, an NGO that has been a catalyst for improved sanitation and social change across India. Now with more than 50,000 associate members who are rendering their voluntary services, the organization has recently /started operations in Bhutan and Afghanistan. In collaboration with UN-HABITAT, Sulabh has trained engineers, architects, planners and administrators from 14 countries in Africa. Sulabh is now planning to start work in Ethiopia, Cambodia, Laos, Angola, Madagascar, Dominican Republic, Tajikistan and other countries.
Working with the Indian Ministry of Environment and Forests, Dr. Pathak also established the Sulabh Environmental Information System Centre to gather and disseminate environmental information related to hygiene, sanitation, and sewage treatment for researchers, academics, policy makers, and students. One of India’s leading writer, has correctly observed, “What Abraham Lincoln did for Blacks in America, Dr. Pathak has done for scavengers in India.”
Achievements
- Dr Pathak was awarded most prestigious Stockholm Water prize in the year 1991.
- Dr Pathak received the Indira Gandhi Priyadarshini Award in 1994.
- Dr Pathak has been honored with Padma Bhushan, the International Saint Francis Prize for the Environment, the NRI Gold Award and the most recent Dubai International Award for Best Practices to Improve the Living Environment 2000.
Lesson to be Learned from the life of Dr Pathak
Dr. Pathak believed that it is possible to blend humanitarian philosophy with an environment-friendly technology and the world is witnessing how he brought his ideas to fruition.
He is a living example to prove that unstinted efforts combined with compassion can bring enormous benefits.
Dr. Pathak has shown to the world that all human beings are equal and deserve healthy living and environment by bravely taking up that cause of scavengers that the society shunned.
Dr. Pathak has rendered yeoman service to make the society and environment more healthy and harmonious. It is for these remarkable achievements that he has become a household name in India and is held in high esteem by a grateful society.
Article by Vasantha Chary
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Vasantha Chary is an avid reader and a passionate writer. She believes in reaching out to people across the world through her well researched articles. She has been writing for the internet for over 4 years on a variety of topics of general interest..
