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WASH Warrior From Trichy Awarded With Padma Shri 2022 For His Work In Sanitation

From raising awareness about sanitation to helping the poor families in rural areas get access to toilets and safe drinking water, 57-year-old S. Damodaran, Founder, Gramalya has spent over three decades spreading awareness about WASH.

S. Damodaran has been conferred the Padma Shri Award 2022 for his work on sanitation in villages and urban slums across South India.

He has been working in villages and urban slums across South India for the last 35 years, to end open defecation by building toilets and promoting sanitation and hygiene among people.

Mr Damodaran and his organisation developed India's first open defecation-free village in Thandavampatty in Tiruchi in 2003.

So far, he along with his organisation have contributed towards making 600 villages and 200 slums free of open defecation in South India.

For over a year, Gramalya has been supporting Reckitt's Harpic World Toilet College initiative in South India.

Gramalya has been working in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh states as an associate of the Harpic World Toilet College for training 3,000 sanitation workers.

For the year 2022-2023, Harpic World Toilet College will be expanding in 3 more states - Telangana, Karnataka and Pondicherry, for upskilling 6,000 sanitation workers along with Gramalya.