In a quiet courtyard in the suburbs of New Delhi, inside a low-slung concrete building, the assistant curator and guides of Sulabh International Museum of Toilets eagerly awaits for visitors. The museum is small, with just one long room, but it’s possibly the world’s only toilet museum, and it’s location in the Indian capital is all the more important.

Hygiene and sanitation is one of India’s most pressing issues. An astonishing 60% of the country’s 1.2 billion people defecate in the open because they do not have access to safe and private toilets. The numbers were probably worse in 1970 when Dr. Bindeshwar Pathak, a humanitarian and social worker, introduced pay-to-use public toilets in a small village in Patna, Bihar. At first the people laughed at his idea, but now over 15 million people across the country use public toilets constructed by Sulabh International, a non-profit he founded.

Photo credit: www.sulabhtoiletmuseum.org