I am glad you found the immersion report very practical and actionable – we definitely hoped it would be read that way. We felt that immersive research proved to be a great way of examining the ground realities of the SBM-G. It allowed the researchers to unpack some of the complexities of the real life of rural households and the dynamics happening around the sanitation drive, providing insights that other methods can miss out.

Though difficult to measure impact as you say major findings were feedback to government almost immediately after the fieldwork was conducted through meetings held at District, State and National level staff. The research was discussed in the Lok Sabha (Indian Parliament) where it was criticised for not covering enough villages or Districts. We are excited that Delhi University currently have 52 students currently doing immersions in villages across India. Students from Indian Institute of Management Indore conducted a similar process two years ago - a blog on their findings can be found here - www.communityledtotalsanitation.org/blog...ugh-rural-immersions.

For those attending WEDC conference we will be presenting a paper titled: Using immersive research to understand rural sanitation.

Hi Elisabeth,
We as the CLTS Knowledge Hub work a lot in India because of the particular size of the sanitation challenge there and engage deeply through participating and co-convening workshops, research, action learning and many personal contacts there. My colleagues Robert Chambers and Jamie Myers are more involved than myself so I have asked them for their response on your questions below but it may take a while as they are both travelling now.
Will revert back in due course.

Regards,
Petra

Dear Petra,

Thanks for posting these reports (and also those in the thread which you called: "Timely, relevant and action-orientated research for Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin)": forum.susana.org/publications-and-webina...harat-mission-gramin )

They strike me as very practical and full of good actionable ideas.

Are you as an organization well connected to those who are in charge of the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) program in India? Do you find that your reports are being read, utilized and have an impact (I know this is not easy to measure)?

And does your research provide some answers/pointers to the discussion that is currently taking place on the forum in the thread "Toilet marketing campaigns in developing countries erode people’s dignity – this is not acceptable" - forum.susana.org/71-behaviour-change-and...is-is-not-acceptable ? If yes, perhaps you want to post something into that thread?

And I am always looking for experts who are willing to help with Wikipedia pages. The page about SBM is still not in very good shape:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swachh_Bharat_Abhiyan

Is there someone you could recommend who is fully into the topic of SBM and who might be willing to help? Perhaps some of your reports could also be cited if they make particular statements about the progess, plans, problems etc. of the SBM drive.

(the Wikipedia article on SBM gets about 4000 views per day so it's worth getting it right; see here to view the stats)

Regards,
Elisabeth

In order to learn from the experiences of districts that had been declared open defecation free, Praxis, the CLTS Knowledge Hub at the Institute of Development Studies and WaterAid recently undertook an immersive research project. The researchers spent three nights and up to four days in each of a total of eight villages in Madhya Pradesh (3), Uttar Pradesh (2) and Rajasthan (3), in districts which had been declared open defecation free (ODF). They stayed with families without a specific agenda learning open-endedly from lived experience, observation and conversations. The main report sums up the key findings and suggests ways to strengthen the Swachh Bharat Mission – Gramin; the policy and practice note presents actionable recommendations ; and the methodology note describes the activities, challenges, lessons learnt and guidance for use of the methodology by others.