Engaged Graduate Student Grants
Women, Water and Work
Increasing equitable access to water for women homeworkers in Tirupur, India
Tirupur, a small city in southern India, is one of the world’s largest exporters of t-shirts, but its residents — wealthy factory owners and homeworkers alike — suffer from inadequate access to domestic water and sanitation services. Whereas industry associations have played an important role in developing water infrastructure in partnership with the state, more research is needed on the distributive impacts of these infrastructural partnerships for women homeworkers who constitute a substantial share of the city’s workforce. Nidhi Subramanyam is partnering with Tirupur-based nonprofit Social Awareness and Voluntary Education to investigate how women homeworkers access water-sanitation services. They are analyzing the role of local associations and state institutions in mediating everyday access and using their findings to identify areas for improving water-sanitation services.
Topics: Access, Equity and Justice; Economic Vitality and Entrepreneurship; Energy, Environment and Sustainability
The Team
- Graduate student: Nidhi Subramanyam, city and regional planning
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Special committee chair:
Neema Kudva, Department of City and Regional Planning
College of Architecture, Art and Planning
- Community partner: Social Awareness and Voluntary Education