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On 1 September 2026, the Press Club of India in New Delhi witnessed a gathering of nearly 200 people in solidarity with the Safai Karmachari Andolan's (SKA) End Manual Scavenging movement, 80 years after India's independence.

The gathering brought together activists, legal practitioners, former judges, and, most importantly, women from four Indian states who continue to be forced into manual scavenging. Their testimonies offered a searing examination of the intersection of caste, untouchability, patriarchy, and exposed the stark gap between India's constitutional promises and the lived realities of those still subjected to this practice.

Brief Background

Since independence, successive Prime Ministers have pledged to eradicate manual scavenging. The Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 (MS Act) was enacted with the objective of prohibiting the practice and providing rehabilitation to those engaged in it. Yet the practice persists.

A national survey conducted in 2018 across 194 districts identified 58,098 people engaged in manual scavenging for liberation and rehabilitation. At the same time, the Swachh Bharat Mission has constructed 122 million toilets, and on 2 October 2019, the Prime Minister declared India Open Defecation Free (ODF).

On 7 December 2021, however, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment told the Lok Sabha that there was “no report of people currently engaged in manual scavenging” as defined under Section 2(1)(g) of the MS Act, 2013.

The testimonies shared at the SKA programme told a very different story. They made clear that people continue to engage in manual scavenging, not by choice, but because caste discrimination continues to confine entire communities to this work and denies them meaningful alternatives.

TESTIMONIES

Usha Ranganathan, board member of SKA, highlighted the deeply entrenched nature of caste-based occupation. She argued that the burden of ending manual scavenging has effectively been placed on the communities themselves, who remain trapped in a system where their caste determines the work they are expected to perform.

Ramdevi, Uttar Pradesh

Sixty-four-year-old Ramdevi has been engaged in manual scavenging for approximately 50 years. Instead of receiving a regular wage, she receives 20 kilograms of rice and 20 kilograms of wheat once a year.

When she falls ill and cannot go to work, her daughter-in-law is expected to clean the latrines in her place. If no one from the family is able to do the work for several days, the human excreta remain in the latrines until Ramdevi returns.

She described how the waste becomes dirtier and the smell more intense after three or four days. Yet she has no choice but to clean it because, she says, no one else will.

Ramdevi cleans dry latrines in five households every month. Two of her sisters-in-law are also engaged in the same work.

Maya Bai Balmiki

Fifty-two-year-old Maya Bai Balmiki has been cleaning dry latrines for 37 years.

After her husband died when their children were six years old, she says she had few options for earning a living. Because of her caste, the only work people were willing to offer her was cleaning dry latrines.

Rambati Balmiki

Fifty-year-old Rambati Balmiki has been manually cleaning human excreta for approximately 35 years.

Her husband used to clean septic tanks for a living. The families for whom Rambati worked would sometimes give her cooked food in the evening or old clothes. Eventually, some households began paying her between two and five rupees a month.

These accounts, and those shared by other women at the gathering, carried a common message: they have lived this life for generations, but it is their children who continue to pay the price.

Their caste has historically confined them to this work. Treated as untouchable, they have been denied other forms of employment and subjected to generations of discrimination and humiliation.

Bezwada Wilson: Where Is the Evidence of an Injustice That Society Refuses to See?

Bezwada Wilson, a leader of the SKA movement who was himself born into a family of manual scavengers, drew attention to a particularly disturbing contradiction: governments and courts continue to demand evidence that manual scavenging exists.

He questioned how a person could be expected to hold human excreta on their head or around their waist merely to provide photographic evidence of their exploitation.

Demanding such photographs, he argued, places an additional burden on people who are already being dehumanised by a system that has failed to recognise and eradicate the practice. It turns their suffering into a demand for proof rather than a call to action.

Saroj Didi

Saroj Didi from Haryana spent most of her life as a manual scavenger before being rehabilitated by SKA. She is now a member of the organisation's board.

She spoke about the brutal treatment meted out to her and others from her caste.

After a day spent cleaning human excreta from people's homes, she recalled receiving a single roti, which was thrown at her and which she had to catch in the palla of her sari. If she dropped it, she would be beaten and forced to pick it up from the floor and eat it.

On another occasion, she fell from a ladder while cleaning. Instead of helping her, those around her beat her with a stick to make her get up—ensuring that no one had to touch her.

Her testimony demonstrated that manual scavenging is not simply a question of degrading labour. It is also a manifestation of untouchability and caste-based violence.

Narayan Amma: “We Cannot Have Even a Single Dry Latrine Left”

Narayan Amma described carrying 18–20 baskets of human excreta every day.

She was never granted leave because, she said, there was nobody else to do the work. Even after giving birth to her children, she was not given leave.

She has helped demolish multiple dry latrines with her bare hands.

"We have lost many lives to this in our country. We cannot have even a single dry latrine left in this country.”

 

Remarks from the Legal Fraternity and the Way Forward

Justice Madan B. Lokur, Former Judge, Supreme Court of India

Justice Madan B. Lokur walked the gathering through the legislative and institutional measures introduced to end manual scavenging.

He pointed to the creation of a Central Monitoring Committee intended to oversee progress towards eliminating the practice. Yet, he noted, in a period of three years, not a single meeting of the committee had taken place.

For him, this demonstrated the extent to which the issue has failed to receive adequate governmental priority. Despite repeated demands for an end to the deaths of sewage workers, such deaths have continued.

Article 17 of the Constitution of India abolishes untouchability and prohibits its practice in any form. Yet the testimonies heard at the gathering demonstrated that untouchability continues to exist in deeply entrenched and brutal forms.

Justice Lokur outlined four broad areas that must form part of the way forward:

The Swachh Bharat Mission must include the complete eradication of manual scavenging. Building sanitary toilets cannot, by itself, constitute the end of the practice.

The movement must go beyond the demolition of dry latrines. Women and families who have been forced to perform this work for generations must be identified, acknowledged, compensated, and rehabilitated by the government.

Rehabilitation must address stigma as well as livelihood. This includes dismantling the social stigma attached to communities historically forced into manual scavenging, while ensuring education, scholarships, vocational training, and meaningful economic opportunities for their children.

Those affected must be fully integrated into society. Rehabilitation cannot simply mean removing people from manual scavenging; it must mean restoring their dignity, equality, security, and full participation in social and economic life.

Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia, Former Judge, Supreme Court of India

Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia argued that manual scavenging should not be viewed merely as a labour-rights issue. At its core, he said, it is an issue of untouchability. He pointed to the extraordinary technological progress India has achieved while asking why that technological advancement has not translated into the elimination of hazardous and degrading work inside manholes and sewage systems. If technology can take us everywhere, he asked, why has it not taken human beings out of manholes? He also called for the creation and implementation of a pension system for people who have survived decades of manual scavenging.

Senior Advocate Anjana Prakash, Former Judge, Patna High Court

Senior Advocate Anjana Prakash emphasised that the problem cannot be resolved through legislation alone.

The law must not only be implemented; society itself must recognise people engaged in and affected by manual scavenging as equals. She described manual scavenging as a shameful reality of Indian society and called upon citizens to demand that the government take immediate steps to end the injustice. This, she stressed, is more than a legal issue. It is a societal injustice deeply rooted in caste.

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