Dalit activists raise issue of manual scavenging across city

Mangaluru: Though the Prohibition of Employment of Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 prohibits the manual cleaning of sewers or septic tanks without protective equipment, civic workers in the city have often been spotted attending to their task without the mandatory safety gears.

The issue was raised by Dalit activists during the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes grievance redressal meet held at the office of the Police Commissioner on Sunday.

Dalit Sangharsha Samiti member Tilak Kumar referred to two such recent incidents that he noticed at S.L. Mathias Road and near Valencia Church wherein the worker was made to clean a manhole manually, but had not been provided with the safety gears.

“Any person entering the manhole should wear safety gear,” he said and asked Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Hanumantharaya and Superintendent of Police (Civil Rights Enforcement Cell) C. Vedamurthy to take action.

Stating that the police was taking stern action against contravention of the provisions of the Act, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Hanumantharaya asked Kumar to lodge a formal complaint in this case. He said the police recently registered an FIR against MCC Commissioner Mohammed Nazeer following an instance of a labourer working at a manhole on Nellikai Road in the year 2017. 

Directorate of Civil Rights Enforcement (DCRE) SP Dr. C B Vedamurthy gave an assurance that he would take the issue seriously and would write a letter to MCC Commissioner in this regard.