Haul up officials for manual scavenging deaths, Govt told

While 14 died due to manual scavenging in Tamil Nadu in 2020, six more died in the past two months, it was pointed out

CHENNAI: Taking a serious note of the claim by Safai Karamchari Andolan that 14 persons died due to manual scavenging in Tamil Nadu in 2020 and six more died in the past two months alone, the Madras High Court asked the State government to haul up officials responsible for the death of these workers.

The first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy made the observation on a plea by the organisation’s counsel stating that the matter requires an urgent hearing.

The bench noted that the details submitted by the petitioner regarding the number of deaths showed that despite Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, coming into force and a specific order that the

HC had passed in 2017, local bodies engaged manual scavengers or engaged contractors who employed manual scavengers. “The officials responsible need to be appropriately dealt with.”

Rapping the petitioner’s counsel for jumping the queue, the bench said while the court should be lenient in dispensing with procedural bottlenecks, petitioners cannot be reckless with sheets of paper without anyone taking responsibility for the statements it contained. The bench did not pass any orders on the plea.

The petitioner’s counsel had contended that even after the court had prohibited manual scavenging even through contractors, the local bodies were not following the order. Out of the 21 persons who died in 2019 while being involved in manual scavenging, seven were through local bodies, the counsel stressed. The local bodies could afford the technology available, but still chose to employ people to undertake scavenging work, he added.