Twenty months after her separation, a wife returned to her marital home as a triumphant woman after her husband fulfilled the demand to build a toilet.





Seema Patel (22), a resident of Pipariya tehsil in Hoshangabd district, bitterly complained to her husband Mohan about the lack of toilet in their home at Chaukikpura village in Betul district.



After her fervent pleas for a toilet went unheeded by her husband, a heavily pregnant Seema returned to her parents' home on January 2014, 20 months after her marriage to Mohan in May 2012.



The husband approached the counselling centre at Shahpur tehsil in Betul district with the plea to be reunited with his wife. Seema, while appearing before the counsellors of the family counselling centre, blamed lack of proper sanitation and a toilet at Mohan’s place for the breakdown of their marriage. She said open defecation had deeply shamed her.



Mohan said he was willing to build a toilet if he gets financial support. A member of the family counselling centre Rajani Gaikwad instructed Mohan to build a toilet at home if he wants his wife to return.



Praising the role of family counselling centres in reuniting couples, Shahpur panchayat Sarpanch Mangita Bai gave financial assistance to Mohan for the toilet.

Mohan told the counselling centre earlier this week that the toilet is ready, following which Seema agreed to return home.



“A warm welcome was accorded to Seema Patel at a function organised at the Panchayat Bhavan in Shahpur in presence of her husband Mohan Patel. Thereafter, the couple went home,” Sarpanch Mangita Bai told media persons in Betul district.



Betul district collector Dnyaneshwar Patil paid tribute to Seema’s courage in standing by her rightful demand for sanitation and assured she would be enlisted as ‘swachchta dut’ (messenger of sanitation).



In 2011, a tribal woman Anita Narre living in Chichouli village in betul district also left her husband for lack of toilet facilities.