KEY TRENDS

•India accounts for 59 per cent of the 1.1 billion people in the world who practice open defecation$

•India has 97 million people without access to improved sources of drinking water, second only to China$

•The population in India without access to water is 147.3 million##

•Indian Government spent 0.57 percent of GDP on water and sanitation in 2008, which fell to 0.54 percent in 2009 and further to 0.45 percent in 2010##

•India provided over 200 million people with access to sanitation between 1995 and 2008##

•Some 1.6 million children die each year from diarrhea and other gastrointestinal diseases for which contaminated drinking water is a leading cause@

•Nearly 65 per cent of rural households had no latrine facility#

•Nearly 18 per cent of rural households had all three facilities (drinking water within premises, latrine and electricity)#

•About 66 million population is at risk due to excess fluoride in 200 districts of 17 States* 

•Arsenic contamination is widespread in West Bengal and it is now seen in Bihar, eastern UP, and Assam*

$ WHO/ UNICEF Joint monitoring report 2012: Progress on drinking water and sanitation, http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/publications/20
12/jmp2012.pdf

## Off-track, off-target-Why investment in water, sanitation and hygiene is not reaching those who need it most (2011), Water Aid, http://www.wateraid.org/documents/Off-track-off-target.pdf   

@ Providing Safe Water: Evidence from Randomized Evaluations by Amrita Ahuja, Michael Kremer and Alix Peterson Zwane, April, 2010

# Housing Condition and Amenities in India, 2008-09, National Sample Survey

* 11th Five Year Plan, Planning Commission, Government of India