“The toilet was full of filthy, mud-coloured water. A man was relieving himself just outside the toilet. And there was this frail woman with a jharoo, desperately trying to clean it,” Shahana Sheikh, a final year BA Economics (Hons) student, wrote. What bothered the quiet, bespectacled student was the fact that the woman who cleaned the toilet could not use it.

“She cannot use this toilet. Where does she go when she wants to relieve herself? She represented the poorest of the poor, who can hardly afford such facilities,” Sheikh wrote in her 94-page summer report, during her internship at the Centre for Civil Society, a research organisation here.

The report, with its “longish title” of ‘Public Toilets in Delhi — with an emphasis on the facilities for women in slum/resettlement areas’, is a product of Sheikh’s lone tour of slums and the outskirts of Delhi from May to July 2008.

On Wednesday, she found a like-minded friend in the Delhi High Court. A Bench comprising Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah and Justice S Muralidhar was so impressed by the college girl’s enthusiasm and thorough research that they directed the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) to study her summer paper and file a status report within four weeks, taking into consideration Sheikh’s seven-point recommendation for improving public latrine facilities for slum women.

“Only four per cent of public urinals in Delhi have facilities for women. What is this mere talk of women empowerment and feminism worth if there is no provision of something as basic as toilet facilities for the poorest of poor women,” the youngster asks in her report.

She recounts conversations with slum dwellers, mostly women, forced to shell out money every time they have to use the community toilet complexes (CTC) in their colonies.

“If I have Rs 5, I would spend the money on buying vegetables for my children and not on toilet usage but under obligation we have to pay,” the college student quotes one of them as saying.

Sheikh presented more detailed statistics before the Bench. “I estimated the expenditure of each family on the usage of a CTC in Bawana JJ Resettlement Colony,” she said. “On an average, a household has five members, the man of the house being the only earning member of the family. Daily, each of them would use the toilet about five times, paying Re 1 for each use. Bathing at least once a day entails paying Rs 2 each. The woman of the house has to pay an extra Rs 2 for washing clothes. So the total expenditure on usage of the CTC by the family works out to Rs 37,” the report states.

It also notes that: “Assuming that the man is a daily wage worker and gets the legal minimum wage of Rs 100; 37 per cent of the earnings are being spent solely on the use of a CTC by the family. This is a large proportion of the entire income.”

The report also highlights numerous interviews Sheikh conducted with senior MCD officials, including Chief Engineer, Engineering Department Uttam Vasvani, during June and July 2008. “Officials from the slum and JJ department of the MCD said the norm in slum areas is one latrine seat for 150 people and a 20-20 CTC (20 latrine seats for men and 20 latrine seats for women) for a plot meant for 500 households.”

“This is the first time someone has carried out such an extensive study of the public toilet situation in Delhi. The court has taken serious note of Shahana Sheikh’s report,” advocate Ashok Aggarwal said. He is amicus curiae in a PIL highlighting the state of public toilets in Delhi.

“We will consider her recommendations and file a detailed status report,” counsel for MCD Maninder Acharya said.