Civic Technology firm Transerve Technologies which specializes in Geo-spatial technology has joined hands with Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS) for co-treatment of faecal sludge and septage at Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs) and also stand-alone Fecal Sludge Treatment Plants (FSTPs) to support a cluster of ULBs in Tamil Nadu. IIHS is a lead partner of Technical Support Unit (TSU) which provides advisory support to various Urban Local Bodies in the state of Tamil Nadu by implementing Fecal Sludge and Septage Management (FSSM).
Under this agreement, Transerve Technologies will develop web and mobile-based platform using Transerve Online Stack (TOS) to streamline the de-sludging process and will provide technical handholding to maintain and operate the system to IIHS and other state agencies/departments. TOS Fecal Sludge Management has been designed to manage the stack of geospatial layers on a web platform and analyse the data contained in layers. In the initial stage, this portal/app will focus on bulk generators such as Community Toilets, Institutions etc. which will be later expanded to households. This portal will work on GPS location in an API interface using data analytics to track the activity. A citizen-facing mobile interface shall be made public where the citizens will log requests to carry out de-sludging at their premises.
The android mobile app developed by Transerve Technologies under this agreement will focus on three main features: 1. Record-keeping of faecal sludge and septage received at the Disposal facility/FSTPs/STPs; 2. De-sludging operator to record/tag source of collection where de-sludging is being carried out in order to ensure that the collected waste is safely disposed of; 3. Receive and service de-sludging requests from the ULBs or citizens routed through the ULB in a time-bound manner. Furthermore, this centralized web portal will have a dashboard for each ULB on de-sludging activities right from the source of septage to disposal facility usage trends in a spatial view.
Commenting on this partnership, Ashish Raj, COO, Transerve Technologies said, “We are pleased to partner with IIHS for this project to operationalize faecal sludge management effectively in Tamil Nadu. There is a dire need for deploying a slew of strategies and urban reforms for an effective regulatory and licensing framework to improve urban planning.”
This cloud-based platform will be adopted to be used by urban local bodies in Tamil Nadu, which are currently being assisted technically by IIHS. Following broadly the architecture as specified in National Urban Innovation Stack guidelines, the FSM adopts a multi-tenant approach to onboard multiple urban local bodies on a single platform.