When the Government of India launched its Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC) in 1999, only around one in five rural households used a toilet. Hence, the focus was on prompting behavior change to eliminate open defecation and encouraging usage of toilets as this was seen as the highest priority. Subsequently, as sanitation coverage has scaled up and the number of open defecation free (ODF) villages has increased, the focus of the TSC has widened to include issues such as waste management in rural areas. While technology options for waste management are well known, the programmatic aspects of implementing a waste management program in rural areas are not as well understood. This handbook seeks to address this gap by focusing on the planning, institutional, community mobilization and financial
dimensions of implementing a waste management program in rural areas.