2. tap water, river and canals. Consequently, there are some
areas of deep interrelationships among these triumvirates,
namely population, household infrastructure and sources of
domestic water in the perspective of sustainable development
andgoodqualityoflife.
Themainobjectivesare─
1. toexaminethenaturalsetup,socialstructure
,2. to find the nature of household infrastructure, and
awareness of the villagers about domestic use of
waterandhealthhygiene,
Usually in Indian villages the Household Infrastructure is not
so good in everywhere and the supply of water for domestic
purpose is not sufficient in comparison to optimum demand.
Therefore, as a Null Hypothesis (H ) it is taken that the
Household Infrastructure and the supply of Domestic Water
in the study area is sufficient and the villagers are satisfied
withtheexistingHouseholdInfrastructureandwatersupply.
The study has been based on household survey with a
stratified random sampling design using a Structured
Questionnaire. In addition Direct Observation, Group
Discussion and Taking Photographs are supporting tools for
primary data collection. Secondary data as of information are
obtained from the Local Panchayat and the Census
Organization of India. Instead of Door To Door Survey for
primary data collection Dakshin Bagundi P.L. High School
students from class VIII to X are chosen to examine the
reliability of the objectives as mentioned above. They are the
children of the village and are scattered in different parts of
the study area. Therefore, if they each brought their own
household information through specific questionnaire, the
situation of the whole village will be found at a glance. On the
other hand, the methodology is very effective to save time and
money. Thus, for data storage, 222 families (which are 5%
households of the entire village) are chosen.After collecting
the data, appropriate tabulation, proper inventories of
scientific and cartographic expressions and different
techniques of interpretation and analysis of the data have been
done with the help of SPSS 10.1, QGIS 2.12, MS Excel and
MS Word. Z-score, Rank-correlation, Bivariate and
Multivariate Analysis etc. are the statistical approaches to
establishtheresearchhypothesisandsatisfytheobjectives.
Sankchura-Bagundi Gram Panchayat (GP) is situated at the
eastern edge of Basirhat-I block in the district of North
24parganas of West Bengal and lies at the west bank of the
Ichhamati River. The GP extends from 22°28′17″ North to
22°50′13″ North of latitude and from 88°46′57″ East to
89°00′07″ East of longitude. It is a borderline village with
covering an area of 15.07 sq. km. Here, the river Ichhamati
itself makes the borderline between India and Bangladesh.
Longish towards north-south Sankchura-Bagundi GP is
bounded by Basirhat Municipality and Itinda-Panitar GP in
the north; Taki Municipality in the south; Nimdaria-Kodalia
(Patilachandra) GP in the west and Ichhamati with Shreepur
of Bangladesh in the east. Sankchura-Bagundi Gram
Panchayat has 13 Gram Sansads (GS) among 8 Census
Villages(Fig.1).
Physiographically, Sankchura-Bagundi Gram Panchayat is a
part of the Active Ganga Delta. Most of the Gram Sansads
(GS) of the GP are under the flood plains of Icchamati River.
Average land slope of the GP is less than 5 meters per
kilometer and the dip of the slop is towards eastward. Here,
Icchamati River is tidal in nature. Soils of the area are mostly
new alluvium and sandy loam, which are very fertile for
agriculture.Therefore, most of the cultivated lands of the area
are multi-cropped. Paddy, jute, oil seeds and vegetables are
major crops in this region. Here, the water table is 0.6 to 8.9
m. bellow the ground surface. Earth for brick making purpose
is readily available along the Ichhamati River banks. The
mean annual maximum and minimum temperature of the GP
are 40°C and 10°C respectively. The mean annual rainfall is
1759 mm.According to the land use survey (2013) conducted
with the help of D.B.P.L. High School it was known that 68%
of the total land area is under agriculture, 9% area is under wet
land, 2% area is under brick field, 4.5% area is under fallow
land, 15.5% of the land area is under residential purpose along
with household garden and the rest of the land is used as
commonplacesofthevillagers.
The study area, Sankchura-Bagundi GP, was belonging to
or , an island of twelve islands of ancient
. In 1857 AD, it was found that a road
had been passing through Soladana from Nadia to Taki via
Baduria and Basirhat. The study area was the pastureland of
freedom fighters of BangladeshWar (1971). Before the Naval
Battle of Dhumghat (1609-10) between the Moghul Army
and Pratapaditya, the entire area was belonging to the
Kingdom of Pratapaditya.At that time, the innocent villagers
of this region was outraged by the military of Moghul under
the command of Mirza Nathan as a marshal. From the past,
Ichhamati River had a great importance and it was the lifeline
of the region.According to Bengali Dictionary, ' means
and means Therefore,
Until 1926, the two costly items could be found in
this river, so it was named after. Pearl oysters could be found
from the river. There was a large business center of oyster
lime at Sankchura. The name of the village derives from two
Bengali words, i.e. ' and ' , which are meaning
and . During the British period, salt
factory was found at Soladana. Sankchura was an important
railway station of Martin Railway (1909-55), through which
Dandirhat, Basirhat, Dhanyakuriya, Deganga, Baguihati, and
Shyambazar via Patipukur with the communication system
was developed in the region. In 1962, Barasat-Basirhat
railway line was extended to Hasnabad. The village was
flourished under the landlordship of the Ghosh Family.
Sankchura-BagundiGPwas foundedbytheirkeeninterest.
According to the Census 2011, there are about 4,522 families
in Sankchura-Bagundi GP with a total population of 20,647,
of which 51.5% male and 48.5% female. The average density
of population is 1,376 persons / km and the crude sex ratio is
941/ '000males (Fig.2). The proportion of child population
(<5years) is 12.2% with a sex ratio of 925/'000boys. The
proportion of SC and ST are respectively 12.2% and 0.5%.
About 62% of total population is literate while only 38% of
Objectives
Hypothesis
Methodology
StudyArea
Historical Background
Social Conditions
0
Kushdweep Kushdah
Nawadweep Kingdoms
Ichha'
'Lobster' 'Moti' 'Pearl'. Ichha + Moti =
Ichhamoti.
Sankha' Churna'
'Conch Shell' 'Powdered'
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Indian Journal of Spatial Science Vol - 8.0 No. 2 Autumn Issue 2017 pp. 108 - 114
3. the females are literate. The working population comprise
36.9% of which about 87% main workers (male : female =
4:1) and the remaining marginal workers. Among the main
workers 639 are cultivators, 849 are agricultural laborers, 350
are engaged in cottage industries such as, bamboo works, clay
works, woven meshes, etc. and 4,794 are other workers
(Fig.3).
According to Sample Survey 2016 done on 222 households,
the total population is 1,157, of which 46.2% is male and
53.8% female.About 55% of total population is youthful (18-
60 years), which is about eight times the number of child (0-6
years) and old (60+ years) population, and almost one-and-a-
half times the teenage (6-18 years) population.About 20% of
the population belong to General Caste, 62% to OBC, 16%
SC and only 2% to ST category (Fig.4). About 60% of the
total population is Muslim and 40% is Hindu by religion
(Fig.4). Sex ratio of Muslim population is more than the
Hindu population. BPL listed is almost twice the population
of APL. About 89% are literate. Of these, 34% are educated
up to primary level, 47% up to secondary level and only 5%
up to higher secondary level signifying a huge number of
dropouts. Out of 1,157 people surveyed, only eight males and
one female received post-graduate education (Fig.5). The
villagers are employed in a variety of occupations like
farmers, traders, common labourers, construction workers,
brick kilns workers, daily wagers, transport worker,
fishermen, basket makers, bidi workers, priests, road
builders, tailors, color mechanics, bicycle repairers, barbers,
fellers, private tutors, etc (Fig.5). It is found that the sex ratios,
literacy, and worker percent changed during 1991 2016
period.
Household Infrastructure is an essential part of social
infrastructure. It includes nature and structure of houses,
number of living rooms, existence of separate kitchen,
bathroom and latrine, presence of tube well, electrification,
television, mobile phones and domestic vehicles are the
major components of household infrastructure. Any
residential house has three major structural components
floor, walls and roof. About 52% houses of the village floors
are made of concretes, 32% are of earth materials, 11% are of
unfolding bricks and the rest of 5% are made by either
marbles or mosaics.At 38% houses have walls made of bricks
with cements, 34% are of bricks with plasters, 21% of bricks
with muds, 4% of earth materials and the rest of 3% of either
wickers or macadam. About 56% houses have concrete roof,
34% tiles, 9% tins and the remaining of eiher polythene or jute
twigs (Fig. 6 - 8). At 26% houses have only one bedroom,
46% two bedrooms, 14% three bedrooms, 11% four
bedrooms and the remaining more bedrooms. However,
about 75% of the households have a separate kitchen. About
72% of households use wood, dry leaves, jute twigs and cow
dung stick as domestic fuel that often causes health hazards
among the female members (Fig.9). Currently, the
Government of India has launched a free gas connection
project, named "Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY)"
that is likely to bring some changes in future. About 80%
householdshaveasizeof4-7members.
Sanitation facility is satisfactory as 96% have toilet facilities
(66% sanitary toilet and 34% kachha toilet). However, many
families have expensive mobile phones, refrigerator,
motorcycle and TV at home Almost every household in the
village have electricity and mobile phones and more than half
of households have televisions. The village is quite far from
the nearest railway station and the market; hence about 73%
of households bicycle, 18% bike or motorcycle, and the
remainingusepaddlerickshaws,motorvans,autorickshaws.
About 86% of households have personal tube wells but the
remaining depend on public deep tube wells and roadside
water taps. The daily consumption depends on the social
status of a particular family that creates specific demands.
(Fig.10)
1. About 48% households use deep tube wells, 42%
from shallow tube wells, 4% roadside water taps as the
sources of drinking water. It is an arsenic-contaminated
area and there were some arsenic-free drinking water
plants which are non-functional now. For cooking about
45% households use shallow tube wells, 21% deep tube
wells, 23% roadside water taps and 11% pond water for
cooking.
2. For bathing, about 56% households use shallow tube
wells, 24% pond, 17% roadside water taps and 3% deep
tubewells.
3. For washing clothes, 48% households use STW, 33%
nearby ponds, 17% roadside water taps and 2% DTW.
For kitchen and dish washing, 74% use STW, 16%
roadsidewatertaps,7%nearbyponds.
4. In 83% of the households water from STW is used for
toilets while only 4% from DTW. For cleaning and
wiping rooms, 82% use STW, 13% roadside water taps,
4%DTWand1%nearbypondwater
5. For cattle to drink and bathe, vehicles to wash and
wipe, irrigation to kitchen gardening and for other
purposes 73% families use shallow tube wells, 16%
roadside water taps, 7% deep tube wells and only 4%
pondwater.
6. "For which domestic purpose you consume water":
about 41% for bathing, 25% for washing clothes, 19%
fordrinking,4%forcooking.
Individual health and hygiene is largely dependent upon
adequate availability of health infrastructure along with their
level of awareness. Inadequacies in health infrastructure and
absence of awareness about health and hygiene seriously
affect mental health, physical health, fertility and working
days. Thus ensuring optimum health infrastructure and
proper bona fides and awareness would make safeguarding
income of the poor and ultimately contributing to the national
income.
According to the Sample Survey 2016, it is found that in spite
of belonging to an arsenic prone area about 52% of the
villagers do not have any idea about arsenic contamination.
Out of every five villagers only four are conscious about safe
drinking water. There is only one out of every eight person's
who do not wash hands before meal. About two out of every
five villagers are not aware about sanitation and health
hygiene. Only 16% of the villagers wash their mouth after
dinner and about 84% before breakfast. On the other hand,
about 87% of villagers reported that they are aware of
cleanliness.Thus, there are huge discrepancies between their
response and actions as revealed by keen observation method
inthefieldofcleanliness.
–
Household Infrastructure
Domestic Water
Health and Hygiene
Themajorobservationsare ―
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Indian Journal of Spatial Science Vol - 8.0 No. 2 Autumn Issue 2017 pp. 108 - 114
4. About 20% of the villagers are suffering from chronic
diseases; about 49% suffer from cold and cough, 25% from
seasonal fever and others from asthma, diarrhea, itch and
wounds, small pox, malaria and others. The effect of hot and
humid climate, inadequate living rooms, and lack of clothing
material are thought to be responsible for this. Villagers
mainly depend on homeopathy (20%), allopathic treatments
(34%), and specialist doctors (15%). About 12% visit the
nearest Basirhat Hospital and remaining on local health
centres, drug houses and quacks. There are about 35 ICDS
Centres with 27 staff members and 7 ANMs under only three
Health Sub-Centres, viz., Sankchura, Soladana and Dhaltitha
(Fig.11).
There are many problems about the sources of the water used
for domestic purposes and household infrastructure in this
region.Aquarter of them does not have any separate kitchen.
As a result, the entire family, especially children and women
suffer from respiratory problems. To mitigate this, a separate
kitchen should be introduced; use of fossil fuels should be
reduced; nonconventional energy resources like biogas and
solar energy should be encouraged.About 75% of households
do not have a bathroom, which should be included in the
Govt. initiatives like 'Swachh Bharat Mission' or 'Nirmal
Bangla Abhiyan'. Even bedrooms are also inadequate for
healthy living. To resolve these, programmes like Indira
Awasa Yojana (IAY) or Pradhan Mantri Awasa Yojana
Gramin (PMAYG) may be most beneficial to the villagers.
Most of the households do not have sanitary toilets; a Total
Sanitation Campaign by the Govt., local Panchayat and
NGOs may play a pioneering role in this regard. In each Gram
Samsad of the Gram Panchayat special kind of arsenic
treatment plants should be set up. Most often, the roadside
water taps are either non-functional / dry or without a key
causing loss of water. Under the supervision of Gram
Panchayat the Jalbandhus (water taps and tube well
mechanics) and voluntary organizations may build proper
coordination to resolve this problem. The '100-Days'
Working Project' may be effective to mitigate the problems of
bathingandwashingthroughrainwaterharvesting.
There is a true proverb in Hindi, "Jal hai to Kal hai" which
means if there is water then only our future is safe. It is high
time to realize water cycle and life cycle are synonymous.
Villagers should be more aware about the selection of the
sources of water according to the importance of domestic use
of water. Besides, they should be more conscious about the
domestic and social hygiene with cleanliness. To achieve this
goal, 'Nirmal Vidyalaya Saptaha (School Hygiene Week)',
'Hand Wash Day', 'Jal Dharo- Jal Bharo' etc. are the programs
as the extended part of the 'Swachh Bharat Mission' or
'Nirmal Bangla Abhiyan' through which more widespread
awarenessamongthevillagerscanbetaken.
1.
Conclusion
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Fig. 1: Location of the Study Area
Indian Journal of Spatial Science Vol - 8.0 No. 2 Autumn Issue 2017 pp. 108 - 114
6. www.h-net.org/.....ID=201577 113 Advanced Science Index...ID=1260
10%
13%
5%
72%
Cultivator Ag.Labourer Household Industry Other paultry jobs
0
5
10
15
20
25
M F M F M F M F M F
GC SC ST OBC-A OBC-B
%
o
f
P
o
p
u
la
tio
n
Castes
Fig. 4: Social Structure of Population
Fig. 3: Occupational Pattern of Working Population
Fig. 2: Distribution of Density of Population
Fig. 5: Educational Status
52%
32%
11%
3% 2%
Concrete Layers
Earth Materials
Unfolding Bricks
Marbles
Mosaics
Fig. 6: Types of Flooring Material
38%
34%
21%
4% 2% 1%
Bricks& Cements
Bricks& Plasters
Bricks& Muds
Earth Materials
Wickers
Bricks& Macadams
Fig. 7: Types of Walling Material
56%
34%
9%
1%
Concretes
Tiles
Tins
Polythenes& Jute Twigs
Fig. 8: Types of Roofing Material
Indian Journal of Spatial Science Vol - 8.0 No. 2 Autumn Issue 2017 pp. 108 - 114
7. www.h-net.org/.....ID=201577 114 Advanced Science Index...ID=1260
Indian Journal of Spatial Science Vol - 8.0 No. 2 Autumn Issue 2017 pp. 108 - 114
Drinking
19%
Bathing
41%
Cooking
4%
Dishwashing
1%
Cloth
washing
25%
Latrine
Use
1%
Room
washing
1%
Don't Know
8%
Other
10%
14%
8%
35%
14%
13%
10%
6% Gas
Coal
Fuel Wood
Dry Leaf
Jute-stick
Muck-stick
Cow Dung Cake
Pabitrajyoti Mondal
Scholar, , WBResearch Department of Geography, University of Burdwan
Email: @gmail.com
Assistant Teacher, Dakshin Bagundi P.L. High School, North 24 Parganas, WB
pabitrajyotim
Fig. 9: Types of Domestic Fuel used Fig. 10: Types of Domestic Water Usage
Fig. 11: Available Health Infrastructure