Introduction
This study was conducted in March 2016 at local community of Lahore Pakistan named “Badar Colony” where people were facing worst drinking water, sanitation and poor hygiene conditions & environmental hazardous. Study was carried out with prime objective of
Methodology
Aziz Bhatti town selected as universe & badar colony as population while three sub-towns selected as a target population. Well structured household interview schedule, focus group discussion (FGSs) and personal observation techniques used for primary data collection while secondary data was collected from official published reports. Total 450 households selected as a representative sample size & interviewed using probability random sampling technique While 120 Focus group discussion (FGD) sessions carried with equal gender & geographical representation. Personal observation carried out throughout the field visits. Data was analyzed using Statistical Packages for Social Sciences (SPSS) and resulted presented on the bases of presentage & frequency distribution.
Results & Discussion
Results indicated that people of local community associated with very low socioeconomic, political and educational status. People were depending of ground water which was severally contaminated due to drop & store sanitation and open draining system which created huge environmental degradation, high level of water associated diseases and economic deprivation. Government of Punjab took initiative to provide Safe WASH services to poor marginalized community of Badar Colony on public private partnership (PPP) doctrine using Bottom-Up approach and Component Sharing Model (CSM) philosophy. Project divided into two component in which external component financed by Government while internal component developed by Local community on self-help bases. Women & local youth were also engaged for the better monitoring of development phase. Safe underground Water supply & sanitation piping network installed and drinking water supplied through gravity flow while sewerage water accumulated to a disposal station for pretreatment. A local Water and Sanitation Community Committee (WASCO) was formulated while after the developing all the WASH Infrastructure, it handed over to WASCO which was running this project successfully in a sustainable way with 100% recovery of WASH monthly bills.
Data showed that 87% population strongly satisfied with provided WASH Services, 91% expressed economic growth, 84% environmental sustainability, 90% declined diseased rates & improved health status, 96% social integration & 79% strongly agreed with worth of involvement of Women & youth in WASH development sector. It was observed that involving multiple stakeholders in Water related projects reduce the work burden and increase the community ownership & project sustainability.
Conclusion & Recommendation
This study concluded that bottom up approach with actively involvement of different sector stakeholders have very influential role to ensure equal & adequate access of safe WASH services and its sustainability. Local community , its culture and available resources also have vital business for transparency , social integrity and poverty reduction through utilization in WASH Development .This study suggested that multiple stakeholders’ approaches with public private partnership (PPP) philosophy should be taken into practice to provide efficient sustainable WASH services in pro-poor communities of South Asian Communities.