Institute of Legal and Management Studies

The Supreme Court recently took notice of manual sewer cleaning being carried out at the Court's own Gate F and sought a reply from the concerned officer of the Public Works Department regarding the continuation of the illegal and hazardous practice.

In 2023, in Dr.Balram Singh v Union of India, the Court had issued a series of directions to stop the dangerous and inhuman practice of manual scavenging and manual sewer cleaning.

Following that, a bench comprising Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia and Justice Aravind Kumar has been monitoring the compliance with the directions. In January this year, the bench passed a specific direction to stop manual scavenging and manual sewer cleaning in all the top Metropolitan cities of the country, Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore and Hyderabad. It also remarked time and again that authorities are approaching this matter with a lackadaisical attitude.

On August 6, the Court made the East Delhi Municipal Corporation ("EDMC") a party to the proceedings and issued notice to it. It has directed the EDMC, represented by the Chief Executive Officer, to file an affidavit explaining as to why manual scavenging and hazardous cleaning is still going on with manual labour, exposing such workers to the risk of their lives and that too, without proper gear to these workers, as shown in the photographs attached to the application(s) presented by Senior Advocate and amicus K Parameshwar.

The Court also noted from the photographs that this practice was taking place outside its own gate.

"We are also constrained to observe that photographs have been shown to us that the manual scavenging and hazardous cleaning is being done at Gate F of this Court as well. Let the concerned Officer of the Public Work Department [PWD] file a reply to the above applications."

The Court has warned that failure to give a satisfactory reply would compel the Court to pass directions for the registration of a first information report against the concerned officers. It will now hear the matter on September 10.

"It is made clear that if the satisfactory reply is not received on the next date, we will have no option but to direct the registration of an FIR against such officer(s) who are exposing the workers to the risk of their lives."

Applications were filed by Akshay Lodhi (Advocate) represented by Mr. Pawan Reley, AOR

Case Details: DR. BALRAM SINGH v. UNION OF INDIA & ORS.

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