Despite ban, manual scavenging ‘privately’ thrives in city
The Safai Karamchari Andolan on Monday said the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) cannot simply get away by saying the workers who died of asphyxiation on Sunday were not employed with the agency, as they were cleaning a sewer line owned and maintained by it.
Three men died while another is in a critical condition after they went inside a sewer pipe to clean it in Southeast Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar on Sunday afternoon. The police said the three died because they inhaled toxic fumes while they were in the sewer pipe and suffocated.
The incident comes just weeks after four men had died while cleaning a tank containing poisonous sewage in South Delhi’s Ghitorni on July 15. In both the cases, the deceased were working for private contractors.
However, agencies are busy passing the buck or washing hands off by pinning the blame on private contractors.
Bezwada Wilson, the national convenor of the Safai Karamchari Andolan, said, “We are reporting every death to the authorities. Each and every elected representative have been given memorandums detailing the extent of the issue, but nothing is happening. Their hands are soaked in the blood of safai karamcharis.”
Moreover, Section 7 of the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, clearly states that no person, local authority or any agency shall engage or employ, either directly or indirectly, any person for hazardous cleaning of a sewer or a septic tank.
Mr Wilson said too often these agencies are absolved of criminality, as the workers are not employed directly by them, but by private contractors.
“You have money for bullet trains, but no resources are being spared to put an end to these deaths. Mere tall talk on Swachchh Bharat will not suffice. Why do we even have Article 21 providing Right to Life in our Constitution?” he said.
A report prepared by the Delhi State Legal Services Authority, which had identified 233 manual scavengers in Delhi, shows the extent to which workers, without proper safety gears, are cleaning sewers and tanks under private contractors.
Three men died while another is critical after they went inside a sewer pipe to clean it in Lajpat Nagar on Sunday afternoon
On July 15, four men had died while cleaning a tank containing poisonous sewage in South Delhi’s Ghitorni