BMC revamps slum sanitation scheme; one contractor to employ 7,388 workers

BMC scraps volunteer scheme for slum cleaning, to hire 7,388 workers through contractor at ₹1,400 crore for 4 years. Workers to be paid ₹768 per day.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has scrapped a scheme under which it hires volunteers to clean slums in all 26 wards, and instead decided to employ as many as 7,388 workers, through one contractor, for the job.

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Bids are open till March 7 to find a contractor who will be responsible for the workers’ wages, and the work done under them, civic officials said. The contract will be valid for four years at an estimated cost of ₹1,400 crore, or ₹350 crore per annum.

The workers will be paid as per provisions under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948, which will amount to ₹768 per day and ₹20,000 a month, said Milind Ranade from Kachra Vahatuk Shramik Sangh.

This is a crucial point as under the existing scheme, Swachh Mumbai Prabodhan Abhiyan (SMPA), the BMC pays a meagre ₹180 per day for six hours of work to those engaged as volunteers under NGOs, Ranade said.

An official from the BMC’s solid waste department said as those who clean the slums right now are volunteers, responsibility cannot be forced upon them. “That is why the scheme was ineffective.”

Additional municipal commissioner Sudhakar Shinde had called SMPA a flop while announcing its revamp in December 2023. SMPA had in 2013 replaced a similar scheme, Dattak Vasti Yojana, which was also considered a failure.

As per the plan, of the 7,388 workers, 5,300 will be employed for door-to-door waste collection, cleaning and sweeping of the gallis. A BMC official said while the workers will try to motivate slum residents to segregate the waste, but if it is not done, they will have to manually do it before loading it into compactors.

Another 1,000 will be deployed for cleaning drains every day. They will also be responsible for ensuring no refuse floats in nallahs having a width of over three feet, so that the waste doesn’t flow from minor nallahs into major ones.

A third batch of 900 workers will clean toilets, at least 40 toilet seats, five times a day. The remaining personnel will be managers, field operators and supervisors.

After the contractor is appointed, three months will be given for the mobilisation of staff, a BMC official said and added SMPA will continue till then.

“The scheme is a radical shift from the very regressive SMPA,” said Shubham Kothari from Jan Haq Sangharsh Samiti which works with sanitation workers. “The previous scheme made hardworking people volunteers and reduced their salary to honorarium. The status of volunteers also left the workers out of the ambit of any employee benefits. The new scheme should not be riddled with the problems of subcontracting and consequently violation of all labour rights as has happened with other works of the BMC and state authorities.”

The workers will work for four hours in the morning and four in the evening and will be given safety gear. If there is any violation, the contractor is liable to be fined for each instance, BMC officials said.