Street performers’ settlement gets 26 toilets

Bishop Heber College & sanitation NGO Gramalaya handed over 26 restrooms to Kalai Kuthadi Nagar residents in Sellampatti village. The project was funded by Bank of America's CSR funds & ₹8,000 from each family. Gramalaya spent ₹6,43,700 on the project. The settlement is home to Malai Kuravar community, who travel TN for street performances. It lacks electricity & drainage facilities.

A project of 26 restrooms was formally handed over to residents of Kalai Kuthadi Nagar at Sellampatti village in Agarampatti panchayat by Bishop Heber College and sanitation NGO Gramalaya on Wednesday.

The facilities were inaugurated in the presence of Rt. Rev. D. Chandrasekaran, Bishop of Tiruchi-Thanjavur Diocese; Rosalind Chandrasekaran, president of Women’s Fellowship of the diocese; S. Damodaran, founder and CEO of Gramalaya; B. Dhanabakiyam Balasubramaniam, president of Agarapatti panchayat; J. Princy Merlin, Principal in charge of Bishop Heber College; and senior officials on Wednesday.

“The project was financed by corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds of Bank of America, Mumbai, and with a contribution of ₹8,000 collected from each of the 26 families living in the settlement,” Mr. Damodaran told The Hindu.

Gramalaya has spent ₹6,43,700 on the colony’s toilet project. “Street performers take a lot of risk to earn their livelihood, but it is sad to see that their settlement doesn’t have basic amenities, especially for women and adolescent girls. With these restrooms, the area will now be free of open defecation and the menstrual waste will be disposed responsibly. We are happy it could be provided as part of World Toilet Day this year,” said Mr. Damodaran.

The colony, set in a 59-cent plot, has been used as a settlement by street performers belonging to ‘Malai Kuravar’ community for close to 10 years. The nomadic folk artistes travel all over Tamil Nadu to earn a living by staging dances and circus acts on the roadside.

An overhead tank built here earlier by Agarapatti panchayat is the chief source of water supply. The camp lacks electricity connections and drainage facilities.