In 2013, with much fanfare, India’s Supreme Court abolished manual scavenging. It sought to “correct the historical injustice and indignity suffered by manual scavengers” – and directed states to do the same.
In Delhi, the government has boasted that there are no manual scavengers. So, it has no specific programmes for their rehabilitation either. Three years ago, the Arvind Kejriwal government bought 200 machines to take over the work of cleaning sewage.
