About Gramalaya in C-62B, 10th Cross (Further west extension), Thillai Nagar, Tiruchirappalli

Gramalaya was established in 1987 with a group of committed youths in the field of rural development. Gramalaya has got its legal entity by registering under the Indian Trust Act of 1882 with a registration No.72/87 on 11.6.1987. The ultimate goal of Gramalaya is to work for the amelioration of socially downtrodden people under the integrated rural development approach.

Since 1987, Gramalya has been operating in Thottiyam and Thathaiengarpet and Thuraiyur Block in the rural areas and in the slums of Tiruchirappalli City Corporation in Tiruchirappalli District. Health and hygiene education, promotion of Self-help Groups among rural, urban and tribal women, constructin of low-cost latrines and safe water supply through micro-credit are the major activities of Gramalaya.

Gramalaya envisions a society in which all people will have equal rights and access to protected water, sanitation , health and improved income status without gender discrimination.Government of India has approved Gramalaya as one of the National Key Resource Centres of the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation for providing training to Government officials in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu. Currently, Gramalaya is working in five Southern States including Pondicherry.

Experimented successfully innovative models like Micro-finance for Sanitation, Child Friendly toilets, Community Managed pay and use latrines, school health program with working experience in rural, urban, tribal and coastal regions. The school health intervention through child-to-child approach, cost effective toilet models developed at the Centre for Toilet Technology and Training established by Gramalaya, microfinance for sanitation models, IEC materials developed by Gramalaya with WaterAid, Water.org, UNICEF and Arghyam funding.

Gramalaya field tested several rural and urban sanitation models for individual households and schools. So far, Gramalaya has constructed more than 1,00,000 toilets with funding support under CRSP, TSC, NBA schemes of Government and with the grant support of WaterAid, Water.org, Arghyam and UNICEF. The Gramalaya models could be replicated in rural India through other like minded organizations especially with the Microfinance for Sanitation model etc.,

Based on more than 2.5 decades of experience in the sector, Gramalaya has proposed to expand its area of operations throughout Tamil Nadu and 9 other priority States identified by Gramalaya. By working with other Field implementing organizations, promoting Regional Resource Centres and State-level Nodal agency, Gramalaya could impact 50 million lives in India by providing safe and sustainable sanitation to 10 million households in 10 States. For more details, please visit : www.thebigcleanupindia.org