The economic cost of being ‘filthy India’

US President Donald Trump referred to it as “filthy India” during the final presidential debate and India received a lot of unwanted attention.

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Key-Points

While he was talking with reference to the Paris Climate Accord, the attempt here is to look at the filth in terms of poor or inadequate sanitation and rising pollution levels.

According to the website “Our World in Data”, part of Oxford University, “an estimated 775,000 people died prematurely as a result of poor sanitation in 2017. “This was 1.4% of global deaths. In low-income countries, it accounts for 5% of deaths.

In India, this share has been higher than its neighbours such as Bangladesh and Pakistan.

In 2015, 68% of the world population had access to improved sanitation facilities. In other words, almost one-third of people did not have access.

In India, only 40% of the population had access to improved sanitation. This is much lower than its next-door neighbours such as Sri Lanka (95%) and Pakistan and Bangladesh (both over 60%).