Why does India have such a big public defecation problem?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rose-george/open-defecation-india_b_7898834.html

There are plenty of developing countries in a worse economic state than India yet public defecation is far more prevalent in India than in, say, Pakistan. I've been to both countries and Pakistan is far cleaner overall.

I would like to point out India > Pakistan

It's mainly because of their culture where they don't care about public land that isn't theirs. Indian homes tend to be clean but when they're outside they don't feel any sense of reponsubility to keep the place clean since it's just someone else's problem, not theirs. It's also to do with the Hindu culture and lack of education. The laws of Manu in Hinduism encourage open defecation and the caste system also plays a part because its the lower classes that are expected to clean

How? Please tell me you're joking

It's mainly because of their culture where they don't care about public land that isn't theirs. Indian homes tend to be clean but when they're outside they don't feel any sense of reponsubility to keep the place clean since it's just someone else's problem, not theirs. It's also to do with the Hindu culture and lack of education. The laws of Manu in Hinduism encourage open defecation and the caste system also plays a part because its the lower classes that are expected to clean

Because of the Hindu society they live in which encourages caste division and leads to people expecting others to do the cleaning up. This sort of public defecation is more common among Hindus in India than Indian Muslims because Islamic culture strongly forbids public defecation as an unclean act.

Because of the culture and a lack of education. Countries like Sri Lanka which are in a similar economic state are still much cleaner than India, mainly because of education and a better culture. While economic growth has led to better standards of living for the middle and upper classes, this hasn't translated to illages in India which suffer from bad public services, traditional ways of life and a lack of education. I've been to one of the cleaner parts of India, Chennai, and the difference between that place and Mumbai is astonishing. To because the state government in Tamil Nadu promotes equal opportunities and education and has taken steps to change traditional social norms whereas most of North and Central India hasn't.

Because of the culture and a lack of education. Countries like Sri Lanka which are in a similar economic state are still much cleaner than India, mainly because of education and a better culture. While economic growth has led to better standards of living for the middle and upper classes, this hasn't translated to illages in India which suffer from bad public services, traditional ways of life and a lack of education. I've been to one of the cleaner parts of India, Chennai, and the difference between that place and Mumbai is astonishing. To because the state government in Tamil Nadu promotes equal opportunities and education and has taken steps to change traditional social norms whereas most of North and Central India hasn't.

Are you Indian/ of Indian origin? Nice to see one of you guys who actually admits that their country has problems rather than being all chauvinistic and pretending it's the best country in the world lol

Are you Indian/ of Indian origin? Nice to see one of you guys who actually admits that their country has problems rather than being all chauvinistic and pretending it's the best country in the world lol

I've been to one of the cleaner parts of India, Chennai, and the difference between that place and Mumbai is astonishing. To because the state government in Tamil Nadu promotes equal opportunities and education and has taken steps to change traditional social norms whereas most of North and Central India hasn't.

Because of the Hindu society they live in which encourages caste division and leads to people expecting others to do the cleaning up. This sort of public defecation is more common among Hindus in India than Indian Muslims because Islamic culture strongly forbids public defecation as an unclean act.

It's mainly because of their culture where they don't care about public land that isn't theirs. Indian homes tend to be clean but when they're outside they don't feel any sense of reponsubility to keep the place clean since it's just someone else's problem, not theirs. It's also to do with the Hindu culture and lack of education. The laws of Manu in Hinduism encourage open defecation and the caste system also plays a part because its the lower classes that are expected to clean

Kerala is unbelievable as well and it just tells you much development depends on the government. For example, Kerala has higher life expectancy and adult literacy rate than the UK.

Yeah I learnt about Kerala in GCSE geography. The government here has taken a lot of steps to control the population and improve education. But it doesn't have a higher literacy rate than the UK since the UK has a 99% literacy rate, whereas Kerala is 94%. Still very high though, and the highest in India.

indeed it should also be noted for the hindu haters below that the cleanest parts of india like tamil nadu and kerala are also hindu majority and not muslim majority.
tamil nadu is probably more strict on Hinduism than the north