Nearly 500 sanitation workers have died while cleaning sewers and septic tanks across India since 2019, despite a legal ban on hazardous manual cleaning and the Centre’s push to mechanise sanitation work, according to data tabled in Parliament.
The yearly death toll among sanitation workers stood at 132 in 2019, 34 in 2020, 62 in 2021, 88 in 2022, 65 in 2023, 54 in 2024, 47 in 2025, and 16 during the first six months of 2026.
However, the government said no deaths had been reported due to manual scavenging, which it classifies separately from hazardous sewer and septic tank cleaning.
Why don’t the deaths count as manual scavenging?
The reply highlights the government’s long-standing distinction between manual scavenging, which legally refers to handling human excreta from insanitary latrines, and hazardous cleaning, which involves manually entering sewers or septic tanks without mandatory safety equipment and protective measures.
The Centre also said that all districts completed a fresh survey during 2024-25 and declared themselves “manual scavenger-free”, with no manual scavengers identified in the exercise. It added that 58,098 manual scavengers had been identified in earlier nationwide surveys conducted in 2013 and 2018.
Of the 58,098, Uttar Pradesh accounted for more than half, at 32,473, followed by Maharashtra at 6,325, Uttarakhand at 4,988, and Assam at 3,921.
On rehabilitation and mechanisation, the government said 89,915 sewer and septic tank workers had been validated under the National Action for Mechanised Sanitation Ecosystem (NAMASTE) scheme, launched in July 2023.
The scheme provides occupational safety training, protective equipment, emergency response devices, health insurance, and capital subsidy for sanitation machinery to reduce hazardous manual entry into sewers and septic tanks.
The ministry also said the Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban 2.0 includes a dedicated component on used-water management aimed at eliminating hazardous sewer and septic tank cleaning through mechanisation.
Why has the Supreme Court issued notices to five states?
The data comes days after the Supreme Court issued notices to the Chief Secretaries of five states, asking them to explain why contempt proceedings should not be initiated for failing to prevent sewer and septic tank deaths despite the court’s directions issued in 2023.
The court observed that its earlier directions had “not percolated” and that adequate remedial measures had not been taken.
Referring to parliamentary data on hazardous sewer and septic tank cleaning deaths during 2023-25, it directed the states to file affidavits within four weeks, explaining why they should not face contempt proceedings for “wilful disobedience” of its orders, The New Indian Express reported.
