Bhadrapur, Jan 16, 2018
Kedar Katuwal, a resident of Kamal rural municipality-1 in Jhapa district, has a different identity now. His new identity is ‘the toilet gifter’.
Katuwal who had been a social worker since the past is now known as the toilet gifter for he not only provides support to the economically impoverished families in his Ward to buy materials required for construction of toilets but recently on the occasion of his son’s birthday donated such materials to a blind person for constructing a toilet.
Katuwal’s first decision after being elected the Ward Chair of the Kamal rural municipality, Ward No 1 in the recent elections was to provide a stipend, through his own expenses, to each and every student at the four schools in his ward.
“I had thought of setting up a scholarship fund in the schools through my personal investment and not by investing Ward’s money. But after the open defecation-free campaign was started in the village, I deferred my plan of setting up the scholarship fund and instead started providing materials for construction of toilets at the house of the students from poor economic background families studying in these schools,” he explained.
Katuwal has provided four cement rings, the cover for them, water seal pan and pipe for the construction of toilets to the students from such families. He has also been providing bamboo to those families who do not have grown bamboo at their house, for construction of the toilet walls and roof. He has been providing all these materials free of cost. “I have also been purchasing cement to the needy families for construction of the toilets,” Katuwal added.
It was his son Aagaman’s birthday on December 17, 2017, and Katuwal was mulling what birthday gift to buy for his son. At that moment, a thought came to his mind – to present materials for construction of toilet to a helpless family in his village.
So, he handed over the toilet construction materials to Bajra Bahadur Karki, a visually impaired person, as a gift on his son’s birthday. Aagaman handed over the materials to Karki.
“He brought the construction materials, including the bamboo, on his own vehicle,” Karki said, referring to Katuwal.
Katuwal’s dream of ‘constructing toilets at the house of every impoverished family in the Ward’ is still not over yet. He has resolved to assume the regular works at the Ward Office only after getting his rural municipality declared as ‘Open Defecation-Free Rural Municipality.’
To materialize his dream, Katuwal will now have to provide the toilet construction materials to 10 more helpless families.
