Manual Scavenging: The work of cleaning sewers and septic tanks with hands is called manual scavenging. Many manual scavengers have lost their lives while cleaning dangerous sewers and shifting ditches. Talking on the basis of statistics, from the year 1983 to the year 2023, 941 people have lost their lives while doing manual scavenging work. Let us tell you that these are official figures.
There is no information about those people whose deaths are unregistered. In the year 2013, Delhi was the first state of India. Which had banned manual scavenging. But even today manual scavenging is done in many states in India. How many people in India still do this work? Let us tell you which state has the maximum number of people involved in this work.
So many people do manual scavenging in the country.
A target was set by the government to completely eliminate manual scavenging by August 2023. But this has not happened. Manual scavenging work is still done in many districts of the country. Out of total 766 districts of the country, 732 have been declared manual scavenging free. But even today this work is being done in many places. If we talk about the total number of people doing manual scavenging in the country, then its exact data is not available.
There are different reasons for this. But if we talk about the previous official figures released by the government, according to the figures of 2011, 1.8 lakh families lived on manual scavenging. According to the 2023 report of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment of the Government of India, 5,80,98 manual scavengers were identified in the country.
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Most people from this state are included
Records of manual scavenging are not maintained regularly in India. And this is the reason why the exact number of people doing manual scavenging in the country is not known. But according to the official report of the government, in the year 2021, Uttar Pradesh was at the forefront in manual scavenging. According to the report, 37,379 people used to do manual scavenging in Uttar Pradesh. After this, 7,378 people were included in Maharashtra. So Uttarakhand was at third place in which 6,170 people were included. However, now these figures have decreased. The latest figures have not been released officially.
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Ban on manual scavenging in India
In the year 2013, the Prohibition of Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 was passed by the Government of India. Under which manual scavenging was completely banned. Apart from this, the Government of India also started Namaste Scheme in the year 2023. Under which mechanization is being promoted by banning manual scavenging and sanitation workers are also being given health insurance and proper training under the Namaste scheme. Apart from this, they are also being provided safety equipment to carry out the cleaning work.
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