The human cost of sanitation

Under the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, a manual scavenger is defined as a person engaged in manually cleaning human excreta from an “insanitary latrine, railway track or other notified spaces” before the excreta decomposes.

While Karnataka has officially identified around 7,400 manual scavengers after the enactment of the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, the exercise, meant to be a turning point in their life, has failed to help them have a sustained livelihood.

In cases without identification, statutory entitlements become inaccessible. Under Section 13(1)(b) of the Act, identified manual scavengers are entitled to ₹40,000 as initial cash assistance, followed by skill development training and financial support for alternative livelihoods. But, even this limited assistance is not there. Former workers argue that even where compensation is disbursed, it does little to provide security.

In this series, we trace the unseen lives of the State’s sanitation workers, capturing the human cost, systemic failures, and hidden labour that keeps the sanitation network functioning.