In a significant step toward improving safety for sanitation workers, the Delhi government will provide Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) kits to nearly 4,000 manual scavengers ahead of the upcoming monsoon season.
This marks the first time such comprehensive safety gear is being distributed to workers involved in manual sewer and septic tank cleaning.
Each PPE kit will include 42 essential safety items, such as helmets with lights, gas protection masks, gumboots, protective clothing, gloves, and barrier creams to guard against hazardous gases and skin irritants.
The initiative is part of the Centre’s ‘Namaste’ (National Action for Mechanised Sanitation Ecosystem) scheme, launched in 2023–24, which aims to ensure secure working conditions, provide financial aid, and extend social security benefits to sanitation workers across India.
Delhi’s Social Welfare Minister Ravinder Indraj Singh announced that distribution would be completed before the monsoon rains begin. He has also directed officials to ensure that all manual scavengers are enrolled in the Ayushman Bharat health insurance scheme and that departments fast-track training and rehabilitation programs for these workers.
The minister further emphasised the importance of setting up Emergency Response Sanitation Units and instructed all district magistrates to resolve pending compensation cases related to sewer and septic tank fatalities in a time-bound manner.
“The safety of every sanitation worker is our priority. PPE kits and health insurance coverage must be in place before the rains,” Singh said.
However, social activist Bezwada Wilson, founder of the Safai Karamchari Andolan, cautioned that while PPE kits may reduce health hazards, they cannot eliminate the life-threatening risks manual scavengers face. He criticised the continued reliance on human labor for such dangerous tasks, noting that this contradicts the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and Their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, which bans manual scavenging in India.
“Providing safety kits is a positive move, but it does not stop the deaths,” Wilson said, urging the government to adopt mechanized methods for cleaning sewers and septic tanks instead of sending humans into hazardous environments.
Wilson also highlighted the ongoing fatalities in the sector, reporting 102 deaths in 2023, 116 in 2024, and at least 30 so far in 2025. In Delhi alone, four workers have died this year while engaged in such work.