Bhim Army chief Chandra Shekhar Aazad has demanded strict action against concerned officials after the death of two sanitation workers in Uttar Pradesh's Lucknow on Tuesday. Taking to Twitter, Aazad also requested the Yogi Adityanath government to provide ₹50 lakh as financial compensation to the families of the deceased workers.
"In Zone No 06 of Lucknow Municipal Corporation, the contractor forced two sanitation workers into the sewer without safety equipment even despite their refusal, and they died," Aazad tweeted in Hindi and called it 'murder'.
The sanitation workers - Puran, 26, and Karan, 28, - worked with a private agency hired by Lucknow Waterworks. They died while cleaning a manhole in Lucknow's Gulabnagar area.
Police told Hindustan Times the workers had not been provided adequate safety equipment.
{{/usCountry}}Police told Hindustan Times the workers had not been provided adequate safety equipment.
{{/usCountry}}Lucknow Waterworks has said it will file a first information report (FIR) against the private agency, while city mayor Sanyukta Bhatia has ordered an inquiry into the incident. "The police will also investigate the officer who allowed the sanitation workers to go into the manhole without safety equipment," Bhatia said.
Meanwhile, in a simialrly shocking incident, two sanitation workers - Yogesh, 35, and Sanju Nagar, 45, - also died on Tuesday while cleaning a sewer line constructed under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) scheme in UP's Rae Bareli.
The workers were pulled out of the sewer line and rushed to the district hospital but they were declared dead. These workers too, it has been alleged did not have safety equipment.