Center for Water and Sanitation (C-WAS)

It is estimated that globally nearly 750 million people lack adequate access to drinking water and 2.5 billion people lack access to improved sanitation facilities. Provision of appropriate water and sanitation services in human settlements has been recognized as an important goal globally and nationally.

In September 2015, at the United Nations in New York, world leaders adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The 2030 Agenda is laid out as 17 sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Every member country of UN, including India, has ratified these goals. The SDG 6 relates to clean water and sanitation and aims to ensure that by 2030, achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation. C-WAS strives to ensure that cities in India are able to meet the SDG 6.

CEPT’s Center of Water and Sanitation (C-WAS) has been working on urban water and sanitation related action research. In Maharashtra, C-WAS team works closely with the state government and local government to support implementation of the Swachh Bharat Mission. The state of Maharashtra has become Open Defecation Free (ODF). C-WAS team is now working on making cities ODF+, i.e. manage waste water appropriately.

C-WAS began its work in  2008, when CEPT University received a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for Performance Assessment System (PAS) Project. This activity now covers 6 states and 900+ cities in India, and has become a major repository of urban water and sanitation database in India.