After rap from Centre, state chalks out policy to eradicate manual scavenging

The government is likely to spend ₹400 crore to implement the policy which aligns with central government directives to curb manual scavenging, said sources in the social justice and urban development departments

Mumbai: The state government is chalking out a policy to mechanise sewer cleaning and reduce human presence in sanitation work after a social audit revealed that 20 sanitation workers had died in Maharashtra over the past few years, mostly while they were working inside manholes. The government is likely to spend ₹400 crore to implement the policy which aligns with central government directives to curb manual scavenging, said sources in the social justice and urban development departments.

The state government will procure robotic machines to clean manholes and weed out human interface in sewer cleaning, said officials (HT Photo)

“We are finalising the policy, and it will be unveiled soon,” Harshadeep Kamble, principal secretary, social justice department, told Hindustan Times. The policy will lay down proper safety measures for sanitation workers and ensure their welfare, he said.

As part of the policy, the state government will procure robotic machines to clean sewer lines in 414 urban local bodies over the next four years, said an official from the urban development department.

“We have already budgeted for ₹100 crore this financial year to roll out the ‘Manhole to Machine hole’ programme,” the official said. “The machines will help us weed out human interface in sewer cleaning and manpower will be used only for supervisory work.”

The social justice department will allocate ₹100 crore per year for the programme over the next three years while the urban development department will implement the programme, the official said.

Work on the policy was initiated after the National Resource Centre for Social Audit (NRCSA) submitted a report to the state government in February. The report was based on a survey of 20 recent manual scavenger deaths in Maharashtra, conducted by the Maharashtra State Society for Social Audit and Transparency (MS-SSAT).

“The survey threw up shocking results. Workers were not provided with training and safety gear and there was no oversight and management by municipal corporations,” said Aslam Sayad, state coordinator, MS-SSAT. “The government claims that manual scavenging does not exist, but exposure of workers to septic tanks without any safety equipment is nothing but the manual scavenging.”

The MS-SSAT survey said the deaths were due to lack of protective measures and safety equipment, lack of accountability and negligence by contractors and absence of formal registration of workers. Supreme Court directives on compensation and rehabilitation of manual scavengers were also not followed by state government agencies, the survey found.

Accordingly, the NRCSA report listed 16 recommendations including formalisation of sanitation workers’ employment, enforcement of legal protections, promotion of mechanised cleaning, licensing of private sanitation agencies, skill development and training, extension of social security benefits and establishment of sanitation response units, among others.

The NRCSA began working on the issue of manual scavenging after the central government-controlled National Commission for Safai Karmcharis (NCSK) in its report for 2021-22 stated that 56 sanitation workers had died in Maharashtra over the past three decades.

In a survey conducted in 2018, the NCSK found 7,378 manual scavengers in Maharashtra, the second highest in the country after Uttar Pradesh’s 19,712 manual scavengers. Between 1993 and 2023, 1,064 sanitation workers had died across the country, with Maharashtra accounting for 56 deaths, said the NCSK 2021-22 report.

Though state governments refuse to acknowledge that manual scavenging exists and claim the practice has been eradicated as per The Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, manual scavengers continued to remain in existence in various states including Maharashtra, the NCSK report stated.

The state government had been implementing guidelines laid down by Supreme Court regarding compensation and rehabilitation of manual scavengers, said an official from the social justice department.

“We have, through a recent government resolution, increased compensation for death to ₹30 lakh. We have also started taking serious measures for the safety of workers,” he said.