Srinagar, Jan. 15 -- In Jammu & Kashmir, the debate over education often revolves around curriculum, teachers, and infrastructure. Yet one of the most decisive factors shaping the future of our daughters is far more basic: the presence of a clean, functional toilet in school. It is here, in the silence of neglected facilities, that dignity is either upheld or denied, and where the promise of education is either fulfilled or betrayed.

For too long, the absence of proper sanitation has been an invisible barrier to girls' education. When adolescent girls are forced to stay home during menstruation because schools lack separate toilets, the result is not just absenteeism; it is exclusion. When facilities exist but are broken, without water o...