The Mira Bhayandar Municipal Corporation (MBMC) does not practise what it preaches. After issuing notices (in January this year) warning strict action against housing societies, commercial and educational complexes who are found pressing humans to conduct the undignified and dangerous labour work, MBMC’s own contractors are brazenly violating the rules.
These contractual workers (in photo) can be seen manually cleaning drains without any protective gear to ensure their safety, even as the civic administration choses to turn a blind eye.
The clean-up job is equally harmful as manual scavenging which is a banned activity under the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 (MS Act, 2013) throughout the country.
The law states that any person or agency that engages people for manual scavenging is punishable under section 8 of the Act with imprisonment up to two years or fine up to Rs 1 lakh, or both.
