Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (Clean India Mission)

SBM was shared financially between the central and state governments, which built local ownership over the results, and was supported by key development partners. The states were allowed to decide the modality in which they wanted to decentralize funding further down to the household level. Just as importantly, there was a proportion of funding allocated exclusively for social and behaviour change campaigns and information, education and communication (IEC) materials, as it was recognized that promoting key behaviour changes through building intention, role modelling, community-level peer monitoring and support, and regular exposure to messaging from media, was important to sustaining the uptake and use of toilets. SBM also advocated for access to sanitation by making it ‘everyone’s business’. All ministries – regardless of their core mandate – developed annual workplans for streamlining sanitation programming within their sectors. This ensured that schools and pre-school centres, healthcare facilities, government and private sector buildings, farms and other spaces were also constructing the adequate number of toilets; in schools, government standard ensured that there were enough for both boys and girls, and that girls were provided necessary privacy and materials to practice safe menstrual hygiene. Finally, given how large India’s rural population is, the government mobilized over 600,000 community volunteers, known as swachhgrahis, by training them on understanding the importance of safe sanitation, how to disseminate key messages to their communities on a daily basis and monitor progress using mobile devices, and organize campaigns involving community members and children from households, schools, healthcare facilities, government offices, and more.