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Source: The post is based on the article “508 districts in country are free of manual scavenging: Ministry report” published in The Hindu on 7th June 2023
What is the News?
The Union Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry has said that only 508 of the 766 districts in the country have been declared free of manual scavenging. This data was revealed in a booklet the Ministry has prepared to outline its achievements in the nine years.
About the official data on manual scavenging in India
Over the past few years the Ministry has held that manual scavenging had been eliminated in the country. The deaths have been attributed to “hazardous cleaning of sewers and septic tanks”.
The officials differentiated manual scavenging from the hazardous cleaning of sewers, maintaining that the surveys conducted in 2013 and 2018 identified all existing manual scavengers (nearly 58,000). So they held that manual scavenging no longer existed in the country.
| Must read: Manual Scavenging – Explained, pointwise |
How India is tackling the issue of manual scavenging?
Scheme for rehabilitation of manual scavengers: Under this, the 58,000 identified sewer workers have been given a one-time cash payout of ₹40,000 each. In addition, around 22,000 of them have been connected to skills training programmes. Subsidies and loans are also available to them if they want to set up their own business.
NAMASTE scheme: The scheme for rehabilitation of manual scavengers was merged with NAMASTE scheme. The scheme aims for 100% mechanisation of sewer work. The Union Budget for 2023-24 showed ₹100-crore allocation for the NAMASTE scheme and no allocation for the rehabilitation scheme.
The scheme will require over 4,800 urban local bodies across the country to identify and profile all septic tank/sewer workers in their respective areas, provide them occupational training and safety equipment, and sign them up for health insurance under the Ayushman Bharat scheme, among other interventions.
The collaboration was ongoing with other Ministries, and the Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry was doing the bulk of the mechanisation work in the current phase. But, the guidelines for this scheme are yet to be finalised.
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