Sanitation and Water Purity Awareness

Smaran Rao

There are a lot of congested settlements in Bangalore where there are a lot of poor people living in poor conditions. This is reflected in a lack of resources, mainly clean water supply because there is usually a single tap for an entire settlement which can be used only for a few hours a day. The 6th Sustainable Development Goal is ensuring availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.  Smaran, who decided to tie his Act of Global Citizenship to SDG 6, shared, "My passion has always been sustainability in communities and I have always held a strong belief that people, especially children in India lack the right education and awareness at the grassroots level about water purity and water borne diseases. Doing my act helped me educate these children on precautions they can take and maybe even pass on in their community."

Smaran collaborated with the local Rotaract to be a part of their program "I-Teach". He added, "iTeach involves students  volunteering to go to local municipal schools to teach children basic academic subjects. I decided to facilitate my act as one of their sessions which also provided an extra-curricular learning experience for the children, and asked a few volunteers to join me. We taught batches of students of 8 to 10 children as the classrooms were not suited for a bigger volume of students. The school has now decided to have "health and hygiene" taught to students as a part of their curriculum on a permanent basis."