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Social Issues › Caste, tribe and social empowerment

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Sanitation workers

Manual scavenging, deaths in sewers and septic tanks, and the law and schemes meant to end them.

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See all: Prelims · Mains

Manual scavenging and NAMASTE: 332 deaths in the sewers

StandardPrelims and Mains21 Jul 2026

What it is

The Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 bans the manual handling of human excreta from 6 December 2013 and the hazardous cleaning of sewers and septic tanks without protective gear; engaging a person for it carries up to two years' imprisonment or a fine of up to ₹1 lakh.
Two surveys, in 2013 and 2018, identified 44,217 manual scavengers, 20,884 of them in Uttar Pradesh; a later survey of every district found none, which is the basis of the government's position that the practice has ended.
The deaths continue in a different place: inside sewers and septic tanks, where workers without equipment are sent down and die of the gases. The Supreme Court in **Balram Singh v. Union of India (2023) directed ₹30 lakh** compensation for every such death and ₹20 lakh for a permanent disability.

What happened

On 21 July 2026 the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment told the Lok Sabha that 332 sanitation workers had died cleaning sewers and septic tanks between 1 January 2021 and 30 June 2026, by the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis' count: Maharashtra 58, Haryana 47, Tamil Nadu 38, Uttar Pradesh 37, Delhi 29 and Gujarat 27 lead the list.
193 first information reports were lodged in five years against those responsible. Asked whether the government had evaluated mechanised cleaning across the States, the Minister of State answered "No, Sir".
The same reply gave NAMASTE's count: 89,915 sewer and septic tank workers validated and 87,037 given protective kits; spending of ₹30.06 crore in 2023-24, ₹35.64 crore in 2024-25 and ₹97.68 crore in 2025-26.

Deaths cleaning sewers and septic tanks, 1 January 2021 to 30 June 2026
India (18 States and Union Territories)	332; 193 first information reports
Maharashtra	58
Haryana	47
Tamil Nadu	38
Uttar Pradesh	37
Delhi	29
Gujarat	27

Why it matters

The 2013 Act abolished a caste occupation by name and left its successor, hazardous cleaning, to be regulated rather than abolished; the deaths are in the work the law did not ban.
Validation is not mechanisation: a worker with a photo identity and a protective kit still goes down a manhole if the municipality owns no machine, and the government has not measured how many do.
The workers are almost entirely from the Scheduled Castes and the communities the caste system assigned to this work, which is why the matter sits with social justice and not only with urban affairs.

Schemes to know

NAMASTE, the National Action for Mechanised Sanitation Ecosystem (July 2023, to 2025-26; Social Justice and Housing and Urban Affairs Ministries; ₹349.70 crore)

Profiles sewer and septic tank workers in every urban local body, gives them training and protective kits, enrols them and their families under Ayushman Bharat PM-JAY, funds safety devices for Emergency Response Sanitation Units, and pays a capital subsidy through the National Safai Karamcharis Finance and Development Corporation for workers who buy cleaning machines and become "sanipreneurs"
Waste pickers were added in June 2024, with 37,980 validated by August 2025.

Self Employment Scheme for Rehabilitation of Manual Scavengers (2007)

The earlier scheme whose cash assistance, skill training with a ₹3,000 monthly stipend and capital subsidy NAMASTE now carries.

National Commission for Safai Karamcharis (1994, statutory until 2004, since then by resolution): keeps the death count and monitors the 2013 Act.

Exam lens

Prelims: the 2013 Act and 6 December 2013; ₹30 lakh compensation under Balram Singh (2023); NAMASTE's two ministries and its waste picker component; 332 deaths from 2021 to June 2026; the 2018 survey's 44,217.
Mains: whether a law that bans manual scavenging but only regulates hazardous cleaning can end the deaths, and what mechanisation would cost a municipality.

Connects to

OBC creamy layer: the income test (Social Issues, August): the other end of the caste and welfare question.
Denotified, nomadic and semi nomadic communities (Social Issues, September): communities the State counts badly.

Sources

ThePrint, 21 July 2026, “332 sanitation worker deaths since 2021; no plan for mechanised sewer cleaning, govt tells Lok Sabha”
PIB, 2 September 2025, “NAMASTE scheme”

Settled facts (dates of Acts, constitutional provisions, standing definitions) are from standard references.