Urban Sanitation Issues and Level of Awareness on Hygiene Practices: A Study in Jorhat of Assam

Proper sanitation is an important indicator of human well-being and social development. But inadequate sanitation and hygiene maintenance is become a burning issue in our country basically in urban areas due to high population explosion, which is a major cause of disease world -wide and impacts on health both in households and community level. Urban sanitation in India faces lots of challenges, where many people in urban areas lack proper access to clean drinking water, millions of people lack adequate access to sanitary toilets, and improper disposal of solid waste and liquid waste pollutes environment to a large extent. Therefore, in this paper an attempt has been made to examine the status of sanitation facilities and its related issues on health of the people under Jorhat municipality of Assam. Moreover, the study also focused on the level of awareness of the people towards hygiene practices in their daily life. The study reveals that poverty, lack of awareness and proper health education of the residents on sanitation and hygiene, limited participation and disinterestedness of residents towards awareness camp and workshop organised by Municipality under Swachh Bharat Mission undertaken by the Government of India, communication gap between authority level and common people are the highlighting factors associated with improper management of sanitation. The findings of the study will be significant for future research and policy framework in promoting community development and urban development programme.