In Bharat, cleanliness is often seen as someone else’s job. Be it railway platforms, streets, or bus stops, no public space is spared from littering. The result is visible in the global rankings: Bharat stands at 176 out of 180 countries in Yale’s Environmental Performance Index (2024), pulled down by poor scores in sanitation and waste management.
Like most social upshots, Bharat’s civic condition is not the result of a sudden collapse but the slow consequence of accumulated choices. As Henri Bergson observed, “The present contains nothing more than the past, and what is found in the effect was already in the cause.” A civilization that once pioneered the world’s most advanced civic infrastructure at Mohenjo-daro could not have turned into a civic nightmare overnight.
Bharat’s civic disaster, therefore, is not accidental; it is the outcome of customs, events, and attitudes, sometimes adopted ignorantly and sometimes reinforced deliberately, that became embedded in the cultural fabric and passed down as habit.
Ancient Traditions of Cleanliness: From the Indus Valley to the Scriptures
The idea that the people of Bharat have always lived amid filth and disorder is a perception that history does not support. Ancient Bharat, in fact, reveals a rich tradition of rules, practices, and philosophies centered on cleanliness.
In early Bharat, cleanliness was seen less as a civic duty and more as a moral and spiritual discipline. The Manusmṛti stressed purification through bathing, breath, and contact with natural elements, while the Vishnu Smṛti discouraged defiling water bodies or pathways. Ayurveda gave this a practical edge: the Charaka Saṃhitā warned against stagnant water and spoiled food, and the Suśruta Saṃhitā emphasized on sterilization, antiseptic herbs, and clean instruments. Together, these texts treated hygiene as both dharma and proto-science.
The Buddhist and Jain traditions added distinctive layers. The Vinaya Pitaka outlined practical instructions for constructing toilets, managing sewage, and washing after defecation. Waste was to be buried far from living quarters, reflecting a civic sensibility within the monastic community. Jain texts such as the Āgamas instructed monks to sweep the ground before walking, wash repeatedly, and keep their surroundings spotless.
Archaeology provides evidence that these values were not confined to texts; they were a consequence of the earliest dwellings in the region. The Indus Valley Civilization, flourishing from 2600 to 1900 BCE, displayed urban planning unmatched for its time. Excavations at Mohenjo-daro and Harappa reveal covered street drains, soak pits, and private bathing areas in many homes. UNESCO calls it “one of the earliest known urban sanitation systems in the world.”
Gregory Possehl, in The Indus Civilization (2002), argues that such infrastructure reflects a society where waste and water management were central to urban life. Later empires, too, institutionalized sanitation. Kautilya’s Arthashastra ordered that “refuse, carcasses, and rubbish shall be removed by scavengers,” with fines for those who polluted public spaces. Gupta cities like Pataliputra and Ujjain show structured drainage systems that reflect a clear administrative commitment to urban cleanliness.
Medieval and Colonial Times: Fragmentation and Caste Hardening
The decline of classical empires and the onset of medieval fragmentation marked a turning point in Bharat’s culture of cleanliness. Large, organized systems of civic management — drainage, waste removal, and regulated public baths were replaced by smaller, denser urban formations where hygiene was maintained unevenly. Cleanliness became ritual rather than civic, embodied in the daily ablutions and temple practices of upper castes, while the physical work of sanitation was relegated to groups considered “untouchable.”
As historian Susan Bayly observes in Caste, Society, and Politics in India (1999), “the handling of waste was no longer a civic duty but a hereditary burden.” What had been a collective responsibility in the Mauryan and Gupta periods evolved into stigma during the medieval centuries.
The colonial period compounded this divide. Epidemics of cholera, plague, and influenza brought sanitation to the fore, but not as a shared civic project. Instead, it became a tool of control. Historian Gyan Prakash in Another Reason (1999) writes that “colonial sanitation was less about health than about marking the boundary between ordered European space and unruly native space.” Cantonments and European quarters received piped water and drainage, while native towns were branded “hopelessly filthy.” Reports by colonial officers such as W.J. Simpson during the Bombay plague of 1896 described Bharat’s urban life as “sunk in dirt and indifference,” reinforcing orientalist stereotypes.
In practice, the British bureaucratized caste stigma. The 1901 Census tied entire communities to “scavenging” occupations, embedding untouchability into state categories. The result was a lasting paradox: Indians valued ritual purity at home yet ignored public space, associating civic cleanliness either with Dalit labour or colonial policing.
Post-Independence Failures
Independence promised a rupture with the colonial past, but in sanitation, the break was incomplete. The Nehru administration prioritized dams, steel plants, and industrial self-reliance, while civic infrastructure lagged behind. Historian Ramachandra Guha has observed that “public health was never at the heart of Nehru’s vision of modern Bharat; smokestacks took precedence over sewers” (India After Gandhi, 2007). The result was a developmental model that celebrated industrial progress but left urban hygiene largely to overstretched municipalities.
Constitutionally, Article 17 abolished untouchability, striking at the root of caste-based sanitation work. Yet the stigma persisted in practice. A 2018 report by the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis found that over 90% of manual scavengers still belonged to Dalit communities. What was once hereditary “polluting labor” remained so, despite the law. Cleanliness, instead of being democratized as a civic duty, remained something to be outsourced; first to caste groups, and later to informal laborers.
Meanwhile, Bharat’s cities exploded. Between 1951 and 2011, the urban population grew nearly fivefold, straining civic bodies. The World Bank notes that “Indian municipalities spend less than 0.3% of GDP on sanitation, among the lowest in Asia” (2016). Slums mushroomed around metros, and public waste management collapsed under the sheer pace of migration. Clean streets or working drainage were often seen as luxuries, not entitlements.
The Swachh Bharat Mission, launched in 2014, made ambitious strides in building toilets: over 110 million, according to UNICEF and WHO. But behavioral change lagged behind. Studies show open defecation persisted in many regions. As economist Diane Coffey put it, “toilets are not just about access, but about beliefs, norms, and dignity” (Where India Goes, 2017).
Family, Education, and Caste: The Social Reproduction of Indiscipline
Civic indiscipline in Bharat cannot be blamed only on weak infrastructure or bad policies—it is deeply social, shaped by family, school, caste, and culture. At home, children often learn that cleanliness is private, not public. Families keep houses and temples spotless but ignore the state of streets and drains. As sociologist Patricia Uberoi points out, “ritual and domestic order are emphasized, while the social responsibility of public space is seldom discussed” (Family, Kinship and the Domestic Sphere in India, 2006). Children are usually shielded from tasks like cleaning or waste disposal, which teaches them that public hygiene is always “someone else’s duty.”
Schools reinforce this mindset. Education is dominated by rote learning, and civic lessons stay confined to textbooks and exams. There is little effort to build habits through practice, such as community cleaning drives or waste management activities. As K. Subrahmanian observes, “civic sense is treated as theoretical knowledge, divorced from lived practice” (Routledge Handbook of Education in India, 2019). Without such experiences, students grow up unable to connect personal hygiene with public responsibility.
The caste system adds another layer. Historically, sanitation work was pushed onto Dalit communities and continues to be stigmatized. As Dipankar Gupta notes, “Legal safeguards have not changed the perception that cleaning is dishonorable work” (Interrogating Caste, 2000). Middle- and upper-class children still avoid it, reinforcing the idea that civic cleanliness is beneath them.
Even everyday behavior reflects this pattern. Proxemics—the way people relate to personal space—shows how overcrowding and cultural habits normalize disorder. Queues, traffic rules, and crowded buses are handled with resignation rather than discipline. Anthropologist Arjun Appadurai reminds us that “the tolerance of crowding and disorder is not merely material, but culturally reinforced” (Modernity at Large, 1996). In short, civic indiscipline is not accidental; it is learned, repeated, and passed down across generations.
Comparative Civilizational Perspective
Bharat’s approach to cleanliness has been centered on ritual and personal purity, unlike many other civilizations, where it is a collective duty. In Japan, for example, communal cleaning is ingrained from childhood. As sociologist Merry White notes, “In Japan, cleaning is not relegated to specialists; it is a social duty inculcated from childhood” (The Japanese Educational Challenge, 2003). Ancient Rome, too, built aqueducts, baths, and sewers, supported by laws that linked hygiene with civic order. Historian Mary Beard explains, “The Romans understood hygiene as a public duty; private virtue extended into public order” (SPQR, 2015). In China, Confucian ethics and imperial edicts made pollution of rivers or streets a crime against both the community and the state. By contrast, Bhartiya traditions from the Vedic and Ayurvedic texts to later colonial practices treated cleanliness largely as ritual or personal morality, rather than as a shared civic responsibility.
Solutions: Re-engineering Civic Culture
Transforming Bharat’s civic hygiene requires a fundamental shift in mindset, social norms, and governance. Ancient practices, while valuable, emphasized private hygiene, temple rituals, and caste-based sanitation work. These principles can, however, be reinterpreted as civic guidelines. Historian Romila Thapar notes, “Texts and traditions are not static; their ethical principles can be applied to contemporary civic life” (The Penguin History of India, 2003). Ritual purification can become a metaphor for keeping streets, drains, and public spaces clean, linking personal discipline to collective health and community pride.
Breaking the caste-sanitation nexus is essential. Despite constitutional safeguards, sanitation work remains stigmatized and predominantly performed by Dalit communities. Mechanization, dignified employment, and universal waste segregation can remove the social stigma while reinforcing that cleaning is a civic duty, not a menial burden.
Education and family upbringing must complement these reforms. Schools should incorporate experiential civic learning, including waste management modules, neighborhood clean-up drives, and internships in municipal sanitation. Families, too, must normalize responsibility by involving children in household chores and community hygiene, teaching them that public cleanliness is shared, not outsourced.
Governance reform is critical. The Municipal budgets are insufficient. Urban local bodies spend less than 2% of GDP on sanitation (2nd ARC), while corruption, tender manipulation, and black money hinder effective implementation. The 12th Report of the Administrative Reforms Commission (2005) recommended transparency in tendering, citizen monitoring, and performance-linked incentives for municipalities, yet these measures remain under-implemented. Enforcement mechanisms such as fines, mandatory community service, and sanitation scorecards must be coupled with budget accountability to ensure that infrastructure translates into actual cleanliness.
Finally, long-term cultural transformation is essential. Cleanliness should be branded as national pride through media campaigns, cinema, and religious discourse, reinforcing ethical and social values.
The formula is simple: Pride + Punishment + Infrastructure + Accountability. When all four converge, Bharat can finally cultivate a civic culture where cleanliness is not optional, marginalized, or privatized, but a shared responsibility embedded in social, educational, and governance systems.
–Om Shukla
Editor’s note
HinduPost disagrees with many opinions expressed by the author. At the outset, we do not endorse people like Ramchandra Guha and Romila Thapar (and their works as well as opinions) who are Macaulayputras promoting colonial ideas. Furthermore, Islamic invaders have an equal, if not more, role in stigmatizing professions. Colonialism, beginning with Islamists, is responsible for the ‘me first’ survival attitude replacing collective pride and dignity. This attitude is still observed, particularly in minority ghettos, who have zero pride in the nation. Several instances of safai karmacharis, doctors, and others being denied entries in these areas and even ordinary citizens being beaten or lynched for requesting people to litter or urinate in the open. Hindu Granthas are beyond the grasp of Romila Thapar and Ramachandra Guha and it is best one is wary of their opinions.
