As part of Blog Action Day 2008 Poverty, today we publish a report about the Dalits of India. The Dalits or “Untouchables” of Hindu society are at the bottom rung of India’s complex hierarchical system. Dalits are denied many of their  basic human rights, restricted to menial jobs and discriminated against in the education system which condemns them to a life of poverty.

Valmiki, carrying out the lowest duty on earth
A year after her husband died, Jeena sweeps the street everyday in the Viramgam town of Ahmedabad district, Gujarat. She was offered the job by the Viramgam government as compensation for her husband’s death. Her husband Gopal was employed as a casual sanitary worker for the town under the Nirmal Gujarat Program. Gopal’s job was to collect garbage from the streets and gutters and dispose of them in a tractor.

Gopal usually worked eight hours a day but was sometimes asked to work during the night as well. He was called to do extra work on the night of 2 August 2007, when it had been raining hard during the day. Cleaning gutters in such weather was hazardous work. Gopal could not refuse to work however, since he belonged to the Valmiki community, whose designated occupation is to manually clean dirt, including human excreta. His refusal could lead to beatings and abuse by upper caste officials. In fact, workers protesting against the night shift after a sanitary worker was injured the night before, were threatened with dismissal.

Gopal began feeling ill on his way home from work on August 3. He was rushed to the hospital by his family, but died on the way. The doctor who conducted the autopsy said the reason of death was unknown; Jeena was aware that no doctor would say anything in favour of a Valmiki.

Although Jeena received some monetary compensation from the local government and the ruling political party, she has to make her living as a manual scavenger in place of her husband, having three school-going children to take care of. Does the Viramgam municipality know that prior to Jeena’s husband, two other manual scavengers had also died in this area? Is the municipality aware that manual scavenging is prohibited under the Employment of Manual Scavengers and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act (1993)? Or is it that the laws of India need not apply to the lowest denominators of the caste system, but simply exist in thick law books?

Despite the horrors of her work, Jeena feels relatively lucky as she does not work the night shift like her husband. On the other hand, she faces ‘untouchability’ and discrimination against women:

“I have to bring my own cleaning instruments like dustpan or broom, as I am not provided with anything for cleaning the street and gutter. I work for eight hours a day and have only two days off per month. My husband was paid 100 rupees on a daily basis but I am paid 2500 rupees monthly, which is less than a male worker’s wage. And yet, there are more female scavengers than male scavengers. The supervisor checks attendance every morning. He asked us to pay even for attendance card. He is very rude and tough to women. After checking attendance under the hot sunshine for half an hour, we drink water separately from other community people.”

Jeena did not talk much about her life in front of her relatives at home, but when she was on her own she said, “I wish I could have my own house only living with my children.” She looked exhausted by the past and fearful of her future, now that she is one of Gujarat’s 64,000 manual scavengers.

In another district of Gujarat, Jush has also lost her husband. She was also offered a job as a sanitary worker in place of her husband by the Vadodara Municipal Corporation.

On 26 May 2008, Jush’s husband Harish and another worker Nagin died while working inside a manhole at night. The working conditions of manual scavengers are mostly the same everywhere in India. Harish and Nagin were asked to block the main sewer pipe in a manhole to assist in a valve repair at night, which was extra work after their regular hours. Both of them were about 30 feet inside the manhole without wearing any protective equipment or even clothes.

No worker wears protective gear while doing manual scavenging in India, simply because they are not provided with any by their employers – government institutions. Are all district governments too poor to provide proper equipment to their workers? If you’ve seen the documentary Lesser Humans (1998), its not hard to imagine Harish and Nagin working in the manhole, soaked from head to toe. In ten years, there has been no improvement in the working conditions of this community, and they continue to have no other choice of livelihood.

No mother wants her son to die in the same manner as his father. Jush forcefully said, “I will not allow my son to work the same as his father, never.”

“The mayor of Vadodara promised me to provide different job for my son other than sanitary work,” she added.

The mayor visited Jush immediately after her husband’s death and gave her three lakhs (USD 7000) as compensation. The mayor himself belongs to the Valmiki community, and expressed his concern about the two sanitary workers’ deaths, noting that this was the first incident since he took office. However, it is the 11th death of a sanitary worker within the Vadodara district in recent times. After all these deaths, workers are still manually working inside manholes, which violates the Gujarat high court order of 2006 prohibiting manual work in manholes.

There are 600 Valmiki families in the slum where Jush lives in Vadodara city, 400 of whom are engaged in manual scavenging. When the father/husband dies, the district government gives his job to his son or wife. If Jush had not refused the offer of sanitary work for her son in place of her deceased husband, her son would do the same work and might also be found dead in a manhole like his father.

“Untouchability has ruined the Untouchables, the Hindus and ultimately the nation as well. If the depressed classes gained their self-respect and freedom, they would contribute not only to their own progress and prosperity but by their industry intellect and courage would contribute also to the strength and prosperity of the nation. If the tremendous energy Untouchables are at present required to fritter away in combating the stigma of Untouchability had been saved them, it would have been applied by them to the promotion of education and development of resources of their nation as a whole.” Dr. B.R. Ambedkar

Links:

AHRC, Ethics in Action
National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights
International Dalit Solidarity Network
CasteWatchUK