ABSTRACT
Manual scavenging is the most degrading of all practices imposed on a group of people within its fold by the Hindu Social order. The practice involves manually cleaning and disposing of human excreta in unsanitary latrines and other unsanitary wastes in public spaces including cleaning drains and tanks. The nature of the task manual scavengers perform is considered most polluting and, therefore, they are considered most untouchable of the untouchables, suffer institutionalized segregation and social ostracization and treated with scorn notwithstanding the abolition of untouchability in any form by the Constitution. They live in sub-human condition surrounded by filth, dirt and squalor and survive on leftover food and old clothes given by the households they service. The laws enacted to eliminate manual scavenging and rehabilitate those engaged in it in alternative occupations have not been effective largely due to continued observance of entrenched caste-based social practices and norms, a culture of denial about its existence by state agencies, weak legal provisions, inadequate rehabilitation package and dismal implementation. The efforts of manual scavengers themselves to resort to collective action and even seek judicial intervention to seek justice and life of dignity have also not yielded the desired results. Their own attempt to shift to alternative occupations is frustrated by discrimination and coercive behaviour of higher castes. They find themselves powerless against the apathetic state and callous society, unable to arouse anger at their continued neglect and push their concerns to the centre stage in the agenda of politics.
