The Prime Minister kicked off Swaccha Bharat cleaning drive at Valmiki Nagar, home to "safai karmacharis" or sanitation workers. Perhaps the high visibility event was supposed to make us think that the PM cares about the people in whose midst he chose to perform a token sweeping. The plight of sanitation workers in our country, sadly, could do with more concrete acts of the government, rather than such empty gestures.
Most of the sanitation workers belong to the lower castes and they live lives of stigma, in localities named after their caste. They continue to live segregated from upper caste people who are supposed to be "pure".
One of the underlying tenets of Hinduism is the concept of purity. The caste system followed by Hindus is based on this concept. The people of higher castes are supposed to be "dwija" or "twice born" as they are supposed to have earned merit in previous births and so are deemed more pure than others. Following the same logic, the lowest castes are the most impure.
The excreta of the body too is part of the impurity. So anything related to excretion is dirty, impure. It is the reason people go to the fields while constructed toilets in homes lie unused. Or that indescribable horror of humanity, the dry latrines located at the backs of homes, in which people defecate and leave their shit for others people - mostly women- to carry and dispose of it. Invariably the people doing this belong to "lower" caste.
The dry latrines are located at the backs of homes so the women of the house don't need to venture out of the homes, keeping their "honour" intact. This false sense of honour is also why mostly women are employed to access the dry latrines. These beliefs are the reason sanitation drives are failing. We need to work from the base upwards, to try to change these mind sets.
Sanitation workers begin their work where our contact with our own waste ends-in the toilet. These jobs remain hazardous and underpaid while tainting those who perform these tasks with life long stigma, which generations of workers are unable to overcome.
Any intentions of bringing about real change of a Swachcha Bharat must begin with a genuine attempt at changing the lives of the sanitation workforce.
Basic safety practices should be undertaken by following protocols for safety gear and equipment. Medical cover while working, education for their children and habitable housing should be provided. Alternative sources of livelihood should also be provided. The law against manual scavenging enacted for this purpose need to be implemented fully.
Though the central government has been funding the construction of rural toilets since 1999,
census 2011 data shows that 43 % Govt toilets are missing or defunct in India. Simply stating goals and allocating resources alone will not do. Unless the government works to find and plug the loopholes these missing funds will continue to bleed out.
The Swachcha Bharat Abhiyan is hopefully more than a renaming of the last government's scheme and some fanfare and photo ops for the Prime Minister! India the land does not need as much cleaning as do the minds of the people. Swachcha Bharat will not be brought about by hashtags and photo ops alone, Mr. Prime Minister!
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