Comparative study of urban slums of south Delhi: water availability and sanitation issues
Student name: Ms Aparna Gupta
Guide: Ms Ranjana Ray Chaudhuri
Year of completion: 2016
Host Organisation: TERI University
Abstract: This paper talks about various water related problems faced by today’s population living in the urban slums. The paper is carried out in a comparative manner where three different slums namely; Ekta Vihar Slum, Ghousiya Colony and Vasant Vihar slum, located in the South Delhi region of India, face many similar water and sanitation related problems and few very different problems. The case in all these three slums is a mixture of political issues, gender inequality, lack of knowledge and inadequate availability of resources. Water testing was done in each of the slum for four different parameters namely; Alkalinity, TDS, Total coliform and Nitrate, to get a scientific idea about the condition of drinking water in these localities. Results of these tests as well as of the survey carried out are depicted in tabular and graph forms to give a clear image and the thesis concluded by ranking 10 different issues/problems occurring in the lives of the slum dwellers living in these slums and final comparison done based on these rankings using spearmen rank correlation coefficient system. The study of these slums give a very different picture to today’s water conditions as it shows that water availability is not the only issue to be looked into but proper disposal of waste water and sanitation waste should also be a major part of our concern.
Key words: Water testing, open defecation, public toilet, spearmen rank correlation coefficient, water demand
