While the city's civic body is busy organising a study tour to Singapore for select pourakarmikas, their colleagues on Wednesday took to the streets to protest harassment and unjust treatment meted out to them by garbage contractors. Their demands included immediate payment of pending wages and legal action against the contractor who sexually harassed women pourakarmikas in K.R. Puram.
The protest, organised by the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) Guttige Pourakarmikara Sangha, drew women pourakarmikas from across Bengaluru to fight for their rights.
Ratna, a pourakarmika from K.R. Puram, said, “We are a set of six to seven workers. When our colleague, Devi, asked for our wages, the contractor, Nagesh, threatened to rape us and even beat us up. He also passed remarks against our caste and said that we must always remain beneath his feet and so on.”
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V.N. Manjula, a pourakarmika from Jeevanahalli, said, “We have come together as a show of support to the people we work with. Incidents like the one in K.R. Puram can happen to us too. We work really hard every day separating waste. We perform our duties without any form of safety equipment, but haven’t been paid since three months. We are only asking for the payment we deserve.”
Gangamma, from Banaswadi, said, “We clean everything from garbage to animal carcass. We deserve a bit of respect. This protest is not only against the harassment, but also to ensure that we get respect, safety equipment, uniforms and wages.”
Mayor Sampath Raj, who addressed the pourakarmikas, promised that Nagesh would be blacklisted.
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However, K.R. Puram police, who registered an FIR in the case almost a week after pourakarmikas complained to them, are yet to arrest the contractor. A senior police officer said that seven of his associates have been arrested.