Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh put his foot in his mouth on Friday when he said “women demand mobile phones, they are not demanding toilets" to drive home the point that “there were certain cultural norms associated with open defecation”.

Ramesh’s comment drew severe criticism from women across the country.

Reacting to Mr Ramesh, minister J. Geeta Reddy said, “It is an unfair and uncharitable comment he has made. We have to understand the psyche of women. It is shocking to hear such a statement from the minister. I hope he will retract such comments and try to do justice to women. Rural women do ask us to provide latrines in villages. No woman so far has asked me for a mobile phone.”

“May be it (the remark) could be true for women that Jairam knows,” said senior academician Madhu Kishwar.

Terming the statement of the minister as ridiculous for having singled out only women for the poor sanitation conditions in the country, Kishwar said, “He is a master of making sensational statements. Had he spent five minutes thinking about the issue, he would not have made the comment.”

Claiming that sanitation was a difficult issue, Ramesh had lamented that though women demanded mobile phones as a sign of behavioural change, they did not demand toilets. “That is the mindset we have,” said Ramesh.

Women slam minister's comments

Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh’s comments on women choosing mobile phones over sanitation came despite reports of women reportedly walking out of wedlock for lack of sanitation facilities.

Ramesh was also criticised by AICC spokesperson and former Union minister Renuka Chowdary. “I hope Ramesh said so in a lighter vein. If he said it seriously then it is most unfortunate. I condemn his comments on toilets.”

AP president of Progressive Organisation for Women Sandhya said, “Jairam Ramesh should be ashamed of himself for being a minister in a government which has failed to provide latrines to women but made cellphones available everywhere.”

Ranjana Kumari, who heads the Centre for Social Research in New Delhi, also took exception to the remark of the Union minister. “Why is he blaming women for poor sanitation conditions in the country? Is it not the responsibility of the government to ensure good sanitation facilities? If India accounts for 60 per cent of the world’s population who defecate in the open, who should be blamed?” asked Ms Kumari.

Nivedita Menon, professor of political science in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), also slammed the minister’s comment. “I hesitate to comment on what’s wrong in having both mobile phones and toilet facilities. I would rather question the kind of democracy we have that women need to choose between mobile phones and toilets,” said Menon.

Meanwhile, noted novelist Arundhati Roy said that she would react once she went through the statement of Ramesh and the context in the media.

Ramesh said he would soon meet film-maker Shyam Benegal to impress upon him to make a movie which could herald a social revolution against open defecation. “I hope Benegal can make a toilet version of Manthan, which was instrumental in revolutionising the cooperative dairy movement as far as collection of milk was concerned in the 1970s. I am looking forward to meeting Benegal soon,” said Ramesh.

The minister also pinned his hopes on women self-help groups (SHGs) becoming agents of change to make the issue of sanitation big. He, however, stated that women SHGs were engaging themselves only in income-generating activities. He added sanitation could become a top priority and also an issue of debate if its budget was substantially hiked, as had been the case with MGNREGA.

He, however, complimented Sikkim for having become an open-defecation-free state and also stated that BJP-ruled Himachal Pradesh was on the way to achieving this goal. He added that 10 per cent of 2,50,000 gram panchayats were Nirmal Grams (open defecation free).