28 Toilet Tales highlight entrepreneurial dedication to transform public toilets

Hyderabad: The book Toilet Tales is a culmination of 28 stories detailing the lives of street hawkers turned entrepreneurs who established the LooCafé. The aim of LooCafé is to spread the word in support of clean public toilets. A group of youngsters- Nexteen worked on the book for several weeks and interviewed the entrepreneurs to get an insight into their lives. The group were also one of the youngest innovators on the INK@WASH 3.0 platform.

The book shares the stories of 28 people from Hyderabad, who had overcome many odds to find success. The book has short profiles of entrepreneurs, men and women, from various age groups and backgrounds, who have set up clean washrooms as part of LooCafé.

"The people in the book are not graduates from top universities but have come from ordinary circumstances to become entrepreneurs," Vedanth Nath (16), a Class XII student of Obul Reddy Public School in Hyderabad said. Vedanth is a member of Nexteen who contributed to the content and design of the 36-page book. "LooCafé is a luxury public washroom with a café attached to it. The company's main aim is to change the perception among people about public toilets," he said.

In the last few months, the group was on a drive of spreading awareness and delivering training resources to WASH entrepreneurs.

"Within the last few weeks, we worked on documenting stories of people who've made a difference for their families and the society from the grassroots level. The social impact it has is truly amazing and we have personally learnt a lot from them," said a member of the group.

"The chronicles began in Hyderabad. It was providing economic support to the vendors and simultaneously offering a public facility through luxury washrooms, transforming their lives and Telangana's perspective on sanitation and hygiene," Vedanth said.