Sanitation Ambassadors Training with WASH on Wheels at Alawalpur and Bhikampur

On the 7th and 8th of September, 2016, GIWA conducted a Sanitation Ambassadors Training at villages Alawalpur and Bhikampur of Haridwar district. The GIWA team, the trainers, Mr. Vikas Jha and Mr. Navneet Narwal, and other guests, including Professor Jack Sim and Sarika Saluja (World Toilet Organization, Singapore) and crew members of Asia News International, accompanied the villagers on transect walks to create awareness about WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) problems. On each day, the sanitation problems observed during the walk were noted down by local representatives. These notes were read out to the entire gathering. This was followed by active discussions on how to solve these problems through community participation. GIWA’s mobile educational platform, the WASH on Wheels, was also used for these programmes. The Rishi Kumars of Parmarth Niketan presented puppet theatre shows from the WASH on Wheels stage to highlight how open defecation causes severe pollution in the holy rivers of India.