Thread by @annavetticad

On @trtworld's @The_Newsmakers with @ImranGarda, #BJP's rep had no credible response when I countered her claims on the #Modi govt's schemes for women so she called it "the lies of statistics" 😀 Here comes a thread on the stats👇🏾1st, a link to the show:

Answering a question in Parliament in end 2019, the Modi government said sanitation coverage in rural India has reached 100%. It also said a survey conducted in December 2018 showed that 93.1% rural households have access to toilets. However... (Contd)
indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/content/466241…

..according to this November 2019 @DeccanHerald report, the National Sample Survey Organisation found that within that timeline "only 71.3 per cent of rural households had access to toilets". (Contd)
deccanherald.com/national/surve…

#NarendraModi himself claimed in this September 2019 speech that "the percentage of rural sanitation...is now almost reaching 100 per cent.” Anyone who visits rural India knows this is not true. Besides, (Contd)
narendramodi.in/text-of-pm-mod…

...#Modi's speech coincided with this news about 2 Dalit children being beaten to death in Madhya Pradesh's Shivpuri district for defecating in public because THEY DIDN'T HAVE TOILETS in their home. (Contd)
thehindu.com/news/national/…

. @IndiaToday found that "most houses in the area (Shivpuri district where the 2 Dalit children were killed) do not have toilets" + there were houses with incomplete toilets and many that were complete but unusable due to lack of water. (Contd)
indiatoday.in/india/story/ma…

Via @IndiaToday, September 2019: The Madhya Pradesh village in which the #Dalit children were killed for defecating in the open "according to locals, HAD BEEN DECLARED AS OPEN DEFECATION FREE on April 4, 2018". (Contd)
indiatoday.in/india/story/ma…

More from September 2019: "Anugraha P, the district’s top civil servant, told @Reuters that Bhaukhedi village, where the two families live, had been declared as ODF (Open Defecation Free) in 2018, but that Balmiki’s house did not have a toilet."(Contd)
in.reuters.com/article/india-…

A Parliamentary Standing Committee report presented in mid-2018 said the government is counting non-functional toilets to inflate numbers under #SwachhBharat.
downtoearth.org.in/news/waste/swa… This thread shows that the government also appears to be counting non-existent toilets. (Contd)

Via @scroll_in, September 2019: "Ground report: Killing of two Dalit children exposes failure of India’s #SwachhBharatMission" (Contd) scroll.in/article/938766…

You do not even need to read media reports, NSSO data or the Parliamentary Standing Committee report. Just visit India's villages or wander around Delhi & Mumbai to know how false is the #Modi government's claim that India is now 100% open defecation free. (Contd)

The Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana too is marred by such obfuscation and falsehoods. Read this @the_hindu report from end-2019 for some details. (Contd)
thehindu.com/data/data-how-…

The Comptroller and Auditor General's 2019 report on the extreme inefficiencies in the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, which was designed to provide cooking gas connections to poor women, has been reported here too 👇🏾 (Contd)
indiatoday.in/india/story/ca…

#SwachhBharatMission and #PradhanMantriUjjwalaYojana's goals are definitely desirable. However, when a government lies about numbers, you have to ask if they are genuinely committed to uplifting women or #women are just items on a checklist for election campaigns. (Contd)

Then there is #BJP's response to the #Kathua rape, the #KuldeepSinghSengar rape, #Modi's own anti-women hate speeches (relief camps will be "child-producing centres" etc), his misogyny ("jersey cow", "50crore girlfriend", "Soorpanakha" etc) &more. (Contd) outlookindia.com/website/story/…

So spare us the tokenism of Modi's #SheInspiresUs campaign on #InternationalWomensDay . It rings hollow in the face of the cover-ups on the ground detailed above & is ironic coming from a PM who follows SM handles known for abuse & threats to women. #HeDisrespectsUs (Thread ends)