- Scroll.in India prohibited manual scavenging in 1993. But it took another 20 years to expand its legal definition to include the manual cleaning of drains, sewers and septic tanks. Mumbai, with the richest municipal corporation in India, was among the worst offenders when it came to the implementation of the 2013 law. Records maintained by the Safai Karamchari Andolan, a national organisation working for the rights of sanitation workers, show 19...

-Hindustan Times In accordance with a Supreme Court judgment of 2014, compensation of ₹10 lakh each is paid to the families of those who have died while cleaning sewers or septic tanks from the year 1993 onwards. New Delhi: A parliamentary standing committee has expressed disappointment over the delay in release of compensation to the families of 104 people who died while cleaning sewer or septic tanks manually, saying that there appears...

-Livemint.com By 2036, 600 million people will be living in urban cities in India, representing 40% of the population and this is likely to put additional pressure on the already stretched urban infrastructure and services of Indian cities, New Delhi: Indian cities will require an investment of $840 billion in the areas of infrastructure and municipal services till 2036 to meet the needs of its fast-growing urban population, said a report by...

-The Hindu Everybody has a favourite villain to blame, yet the herd of restive elephants in the room is led by a particularly malevolent matriarch — corruption The floods have abated in Bengaluru. As individuals struggle to clean their houses, the silt on the roads left behind by the receding water — now a fine dust that flies in the air choking us — is a reminder of those difficult times. Various analyses...

-Down to Earth A lot needs to be done to ensure faecal sludge is treated before reaching water source Are we losing focus of the Prime Minister’s dream project Swachh Bharat Mission (grameen)? Whatever the answer is, the fact is we cannot afford to do so.  In October 2019, rural India was declared open-defecation free. By this, the department of drinking water and sanitation under the Union Ministry of Jal Shakti meant that...