'On Aug. 15, PM must vow to abolish manual scavenging'

Ramon Magsaysay awardee Bezwada Wilson interacted exclusively with The Hindu’s readers on Thursday

Bezwada Wilson. Photo: Sandeep Saxena

Ramon Magsaysay award winner Bezwada Wilson said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi must vow to make India manual scavenging-free on August 15, just like how he had vowed to make India clean through the Swacch Bharat campaign from the ramparts of the Red Fort. In an hour-long exclusive live chat session with the readers of The Hindu , he urged citizens and political leaders alike to pitch in to ensure that the practice of manual scavenging or cleaning human waste for a living is eradicated. Expressing concern over the status of Dalits in independent India, Mr. Wilson said, “Hope we will reach our destination of an equal society soon.”

Mr. Wilson fielded around 40 comments from readers during the session. The questions ranged from the citizen’s role in ensuring sewer cleaners have a better life to improving sanitation infrastructure in cities and towns so that manual scavengers don’t have to humiliate themselves any longer.

“Cities can become smart when there is proper sanitation system. The trains can move without shame when shit is not falling on the track,” Mr. Wilson said tackling a question from a reader on the Indian Railways being one of the violators of the law prohibiting manual scavenging. He told readers to reach out to manual scavengers by proactively identifying them. “Stop discriminating persons in the name of caste, gender and creed,” he said.

Fielding questions from panellist G. Ananthakrishnan of

The Hindu on the Swacch Bharat Abhiyan being unable to address problems of manual scavenging, Mr. Wilson said that the scheme must aim to mechanise the cleaning of sewer and septic tanks. To another question, he said that no State in the country was free of manual scavenging, including Kerala, where dry latrines have been found. He also agreed that the government employed sanitation staff on the basis of caste. “Maharashtra reserved the work to only for the sweeping community,” he said. He also observed that allocations for fixing manual scavenging were less and officers weren’t efficiently utilising whatever funds were available.

To a reader’s question on how he would put the prize money to use, Mr. Wilson said that the whole prize money will go to persons engaged in manual scavenging for rehabilitation.

The live chat was also a rare moment of reunion with old community members from Mr. Wilson’s hometown Kolar, Karnataka. Israel Babu of Kolar Gold Fields commented that manual scavenging still existed in the town and that most of them were employees who worked for Barath Gold Mines Ltd. To this Mr. Wilson responded: “I know you Israel, I know you from two generations…” and stressed that all safai karmachari workers were one family that needed urgent rescuing from their collective plight.

Here is the >transcript of the chat .