Hundreds of people lose lives every year while cleaning sewers?
Cleaning sewers becomes costly for many people. Yes, in our country, hundreds of people lose their lives while doing work like sewer cleaning. Many times people die due to poisonous gas as soon as they get into the sewer tank. In such a situation, let us know how sewer cleaning is done in neighboring country pakistan and do many people lose their lives while cleaning sewers there too?
So many people lost their lives while cleaning sewers in India
According to the government data presented in Parliament, between 2019 and 2023, at least 377 people have died across the country due to dangerous cleaning of sewers and septic tanks. If the data is to be believed, about 70 people lose their lives in the country every year while doing sewer cleaning work. Let us tell you that in India, sewer cleaning work is mainly done by people of the Dalit community. Due to the caste system that has been going on for centuries, this work has become a curse for the Dalits. These people have to get down into dirty drains without any safety equipment, which puts their lives at risk.
What is the condition of sewer cleaning in Pakistan?
You will be surprised to know, but in pakistan too, sewer cleaning work is mainly done by religious minorities, especially Christians. These people have to work at low wages and they are not even given safety equipment. Actually, casteism and religious discrimination is also prevalent in Pakistan. Here Christians are considered the lowest class of society and are forced to do dirty work.
In the year 2020, the New York Times has reported on the condition of people of Christian religion in pakistan, which tells how Christians are treated with discrimination in Pakistan. Their condition has been kept the worst in the society. They neither get any safety equipment, nor gloves nor masks to clean the sewer. A sanitation worker gets only Rs 400 for cleaning three to four sewers. Let us tell you that there are no exact figures available about the number of deaths during sewer cleaning in pakistan, but it is believed that like India, many people lose their lives here every year. Although sewer cleaning has been declared illegal in pakistan, this law is still not followed at the ground level.