Thousands of manual scavengers die each year while cleaning sewers in India. The practice was banned 25 years ago with the passing of the Employment of Manual Scavengers and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act, 1993, but continues unhinged.
A new report shed light on the miserable and shameful sewer deaths in the country stating that since January 1, 2017, one person has died every five days, on an average, while manually cleaning sewers and septic tanks. The numbers gathered by the?National Commission for Safai Karamcharis (NCSK), were largely based on newspaper reports and figures supplied by a few state government.?
A government taskforce this year reported that there were as many as 53,236 manual scavengers in 121 districts out of 600 districts in the country. However, the official records from 2017 reported just fourth that, for the entire country.
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Since sanitation workers employed with the Railways performing such functions had not been counted, the actual number is much higher.
While manual scavenging remains non-existent for government, people have continued to die in sewers. But this new machine may soon be able to put an end to the misery of manual scavengers, giving them a dignified work. On November 19, World Toilet Day, Sulabh launched a machine to terminate the tragic and reprehensible record.
BCCL
The machine injects high-pressure water into the tunnels and then collects the waste with a mechanical bucket operated from ground level. A remote-control inspection camera generates high-resolution images of the sewer system.
While unveiling the machine, Bindeshwar Pathak, the Sulabh International founder, said that forcing humans into the sewers was "demeaning". "We hear so often the tragic news about sewer workers losing their lives," he said.?
"This machine can safely clean the waste matter and it will gradually make manual scavenging redundant. With this machine, we hope no person will die in the sewers anymore," he added.
He added the sewer deaths are a national issue.
In India, close to 150 million people do not have a toilet at home. Thousands of mostly low-caste Indians are employed in one of the dirtiest jobs unclogging human waste from underground pipes. The waste is scraped with bare hands without any protective gear or masks.
The practice has resulted in thousands of deaths, primarily due to suffocation.
BCCL
According to the Supreme Court¡¯s 2014 order, entering sewer lines without safety gears should be made a crime and for each sewer death, Rs 10 lakh compensation should be given to the family of the deceased.
It is noteworthy that the Supreme Court while pronouncing the compensation order, on the hindsight accepted that manual scavenging, a practice outlawed more than 25 years ago, still exists. While the government and civic authorities are perpetually on a denial mode about the reality of manual scavenging, the data speaks otherwise.
In efforts to eradicate the age-old practice of manual scavenging, Kerala has started to replace men cleaning up sewer holes. ¡®Bandicoot¡¯, the robot developed by the startup firm Genrobotics, will be used for cleaning sewer holes.?
The Delhi Jal Board has also launched its first batch of mechanised sewer cleaning machines. In the program, Dalits and former manual scavengers will be given preference in selection.
The cost and value of human life are negligible in the country and when cheap options are available, no one wants to switch to robotic cleaning, which of course costs more.
Even with the mechanisation of sewer cleaning, the practice and measures remain caste-driven and most of these plans die a slow death on papers.
Clearly, mechanical cleaning is an option to clean up India¡¯s sewers, but heavy reliance on cheap labour is a deterrent for actions to take off.?