JAGTIAL: Remember the case where a woman from Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh refused to tie the knot with a man as the latter failed to get a toilet built at his residence in time for the wedding? During the Swachh Abhiyan campaign last year, the woman’s refusal to marry the man she was engaged to created a stir and awareness among the women about the social stigma women face due to lack of individual toilets.
Nearly 11 months after the incident that hit the newspaper headlines nationwide, a similar incident took place in Jagtial district. In this case, a girl refused to marry her boyfriend and postponed the marriage because the groom’s family did not have a toilet in their house.
The marriage, which was to be held in February, was postponed and was performed on March 6 after the groom’s family constructed toilets in their house at Kolwai in Bheerpur mandal. The incident came to light when officials went for a survey of the number of Individual Sanitary Latrines constructed in the village.
After almost a year of being into relationship, Sandugula Satyavati (22) and Edula Tirupathi (23) were to be married in February. When she came to know that there was no toilet in the groom’s house, she insisted that they build toilets and warned that there would be no marriage till toilets were constructed.
“It is a matter of self-respect for every woman. I told his family that I did not need any gold ornaments for marriage but demanded construction of a toilet at their house,” she told Express.