Lifting the Lid Off the Toilet—Understanding the Indian Context and A Case on Samagra Empowerment Foundation

Abstract

This case features Samagra, an Indian social enterprise which was formed with the goal to tackle the wicked problem of open defecation in India by providing dignified toilet access to millions living in urban slums. In 2017, two equally passionate members, a gifted engineer, Rahul Nayak, and an educator, Iti Mathur, joined their team. Samagra’s original business model focused on building and maintaining toilets for the urban poor. However, by 2017, having gone through multiple business model iterations, they had revised their business to use state-of-the-art technology and reduce the operating expenses of school, public, and community toilets in urban slums of Pune. By 2017, Samagra had developed memorandums of understandings (MOUs) with 6 municipalities across the country to build & maintain public and community toilets.