Gujarat's protesting women scavenging workers refuse to relent, three rushed to hospital as they fall ill

Three of the 71 manual scavenger women from Wadhwan township of Surendranagar district in Gujarat, sitting on dharna outside the collector's office for the last one week to protest against refusal of the Wadhwan municipal authorities to ensure payment of minimum wages, were rushed to the hospital after they fell ill. A statement by the Mahila Adhikar Panch, which is leading the protest, said that this happened because "they were on indefinite protest fast". The women, who protested outside the district collector's office also, have already sent a letter to Gujarat chief minister Anandiben Patel, which said that they were paid Rs 150 per day despite working for eight hours, which is Rs 82 less than the minimum wages.

The women workers of Wadhwan are on strike against the despicable practice of manual scavenging. Sitting on dharna in front of the Surendranagar district collector’s office with placards such as “manual scavenging continues in Modi’s Gujarat” and “real face of Vibrant Gujarat” in their hand, the women workers, employed through contractor, demanded that they should be paid minimum wages and provided protective equipment for their work. Earlier, they took out a protest rally.
In a written representation to the district collector, Surendrangar, a delegation under the leadership of Sarojben Hasmukhbhai Valodara of the Mahila Adhikar Panch, the women workers said that they want “early implementation of the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013”, which bans manual scavenging in all its manifestations, including manual cleaning of human excreta and cleaning up gutters without protective equipment. “The authorities should go out of the way to propagate about this law”, it said.
The representation complained, the 71 women workers working on contract get merely Rs 150 per day, “which is Rs 80.30 less than the minimum wages," adding, “Despite the type of work they do, they have not been regularized. They are not given any pay slips, nor do they have any identity card. While the contractor deducts money from their wage for employees’ provident fund, they have not been given any slip for this. We therefore demand that not only should they be paid minimum wages, they should get pay slips, identity cards and provident fund slips.”

Along with the women workers, 25 drivers collecting filth from around the city to be dumped at a land-fill site outside the town, went on strike with similar demands. The representation said, “The drivers are given Rs 100 per day as wages, which is Rs 132.30 less than the minimum wages, nor are they given pay slips, identity cards of provident fund slips. All this should be regularized for them as well.” It added, “Neither the women workers nor the drivers are given even the simple broom or the carrying box. In fact, they have to spend money from their own pocket for this. This should be immediately looked into.”
The representation further said that “despite their written plea to the deputy collector in Wadhwan and the authorities in the municipality, our problems remain unresolved.” It demanded, “We want that our pay should be deposited in our accounts opened in the nationalized bank under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Jan Dhan project.” It added, “We also want that action should be taken against the contractors who do not pay us minimum wages, and are involved in misappropriating funds given to them by the municipality to pay us wages. Also, action should be taken against them for not giving up protective equipment.”

Month-long protest in neighbouring town ends

Meanwhile, the manual scavengers, belonging to the neighbouring Doodhrej municipality of Surendrangar district, ended their nearly month-long protest against the authorities after the latter handed over a written assurance that their major demands, especially those related to providing them with fair wages and necessary safety equipment, would be met. This, the letter hopes, would take care of the issue that the workers have to manually clean up human excreta. The assurance follows Dalit rights NGO Navsarjan Trust director Manjula Pradeep’s meeting with Surendranagar district collector KB Bhatt, who agreed the manual scavengers’ plight was being “ignored.”
A perusal of the eight-point assurance, however, suggests that the authorities have not concede to the main demand of the manual scavengers that they should be rehabilitated in occupations other than the caste-based ones they are condemned to do for generations. The most important “concession” they could extract was, no action would be taken against any of the protesting workers, a few of whom were “sacked”. Another assurance relates to action to be initiated officials who “misbehaved” and “forced” them to manually clean up dirt.

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