By Prasanth Shanmugasundaram

Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu: “My life is nothing short of hell.”

Murukathal (48), a thooimai kavalargal ('sanitation guards') or temporary sanitation worker in Thensangampalayam panchayat under Anaimalai union, Coimbatore, told 101Reporters that she has been doing this job for six years. “Even if a dog dies in the village, I have to pick it up. I clean garbage and waste with my hands, and I only earn Rs 5,000,” she said.

“Sometimes, while collecting garbage from households, people give me Rs 10 or so for tea. We survive on this small mercy. We also manage to earn Rs 2,500 to 3,000 a month by selling plastic and scrap iron we sort out from the waste. Four of us share this amount, so each person gets around Rs 500 extra,” she added. “Just a cooking cylinder costs Rs 960. Ten kilograms of rice is Rs 600, milk is Rs 48 per litre. How is it possible to survive on just Rs 166 a day? Even after working in such harsh conditions, I cannot feed my family properly.”

She’s not alone. Across rural Tamil Nadu, thousands of temporary sanitation workers, most of them women, are overworked, underpaid, and left without basic protections like health insurance or safety gear. Many panchayats operate with a severe shortage of permanent sanitation staff, pushing the entire burden onto these temporary workers. Despite working all 30 days a month, without holidays or support, they continue to earn far below the minimum wage mandated by the state.

General Secretary of the Tamil Nadu Rural Development Workers Union, Krishnasamy, told 101Reporters that between 9,700 and 10,300 permanent sanitation posts across the state are currently lying vacant.

The sanitation workers clean the streets, but no one is in their corner.

“We’re done being treated like dirt,” Krishnasamy said, adding that the union has called for a statewide strike starting August 5. Earlier, they had held sit-in protests at the district collectorates across the state on July 22. 

Mismatch

Tamil Nadu ranks among the top ten states in India in terms of both population and the number of village panchayats. The state has 12,524 village panchayats. According to 2013 data, the government employed 26,622 permanent sanitation workers to maintain cleanliness in these areas. But by 2015, the state had outsourced sanitation work to 66,025 temporary workers, assigning one worker per 150 households to implement the Solid Waste Management Programme. Notably, 98% of these workers are women. No new permanent appointments have been made since 2015.

These workers are tasked with collecting household waste, converting it into compost, and maintaining village sanitation. However, only about 20% of Tamil Nadu’s village panchayats actually process solid waste into manure. In these areas, compost is sold at Rs 7 to Rs 9 per kg, allowing workers to earn a small additional income. But in the remaining 80% of panchayats, waste is either burned or buried in dumpyards, depriving workers of even this modest opportunity.

In 2015, the daily wage of these temporary workers was Rs 87, which would amount to about Rs 2,600 per month. This was revised in 2023, when the Tamil Nadu government raised it to Rs 5,000 per month, or roughly Rs 166 a day. 

“Temporary workers do everything that permanent staff are supposed to do, but without any of the benefits,” said Krishnasamy. “They get no insurance, no job security, and no respect. We have demanded that those who’ve served for over five years be made permanent, and that wages be increased to at least Rs 12,593 per month, as per the Minimum Wages Act, 1948. But the government hasn’t responded.”

He added, “Anyone who is medically fit and under 45 years of age qualifies to become a permanent sanitation worker. But these posts haven’t been filled in over a decade, not after retirements, not after deaths, not even after transfers. Meanwhile, the population has grown, but the number of workers has not.”

Constant grind

Muthulakshmi, another temporary sanitation worker from Thensangampalayam panchayat, said that she starts work at 7 am. “Two workers take one cart and go street by street to collect garbage. If there’s too much waste, we use the panchayat’s tractor. After that, we transport it to the compost treatment site. There, we separate biodegradable and non-degradable waste with our hands and prepare compost. We finish by 4 or 5 pm, with just an hour for lunch.” 

“We are occasionally given cloth-based gloves, but they tear easily. Shoes and face masks are given just once a year, and they wear out in a few days. Wastewater seeps into our hands, causing a foul smell,” she said.  “Since waste collection takes the whole day, we can’t take up any other work for extra income,” she said. “We often don’t have enough money for basic groceries. We couldn’t even buy new clothes for festivals. Eating meat has become impossible.”

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Her family of five lives in a house with a steel sheet roof, built on government-allotted land. Her daughter is disabled, and her husband, a farm labourer, earns Rs 350-400 per day. But only when work is available.

“Nobody respects us nor treats us as human beings,” she added.

Masilamani (44), a sweeper from Ramanamudhalipudur panchayat in the same union, said they earn less than even workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS).
“I have two sons and a daughter studying in government schools. We live on porambokku land (government-owned land). My husband is a farm labourer. MGNREGS workers earn Rs 336 per day. But we get only Rs 166. Meanwhile, permanent sanitation workers get Rs 9,000, and seniors even up to Rs 12,000. We get just Rs 5,000. It is unfair.”

Describing the health risks they face, she said, “The garbage that we touch every day causes skin allergies and itching. Sometimes, our throats get irritated from the garbage. But none of this matters to the government. We don’t even have annual medical check-ups. Permanent sanitation workers get health insurance and accident coverage under the National Health Insurance Scheme, with premiums paid by the Tamil Nadu government. Medical camps are conducted for them every six months. But we get nothing.”

She added, “We do the dirtiest work that no one else wants to touch. We raise our voices in every gram sabha, and sometimes salary hike resolutions are even passed. Yet, nothing changes.”

Workaround

According to Rajkumar, former President of the Kambalapatti Panchayat in Coimbatore district, in some villages, officials are forced to misuse the central government’s Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to support sanitation workers. 

“How can anyone be expected to clean the entire village all day for Rs 5,000? It is modern slavery,” he said. “We unofficially issue MGNREGS job cards in the name of the temporary sanitation workers’ husbands or parents. We fake attendance so that they can be paid Rs 336 a day, about Rs 5,000 to 7,000 a month. It’s legally a fraud, but we do it to help their families survive.”

However, Senthil Kumar, former President of Jallipatti Panchayat in Tiruppur district, said that since MGNREGS workers have to upload geotagged photos of their work, it is not easy to “fake the records”.

“In some places, it still happens,” he said. 

Kumar also explained how the panchayat does not have enough funds to pay temporary sanitation workers. “The population of Jallipatti is around 4,400, and the panchayat receives Rs 15 lakh per year from the government for sanitation. It earns another Rs 10 lakh from taxes on businesses, including recent tax hikes. Of the combined Rs 25 lakh, around 7-10 lakh is spent on sanitation,” he said. 
“We don’t have enough from the government to pay temporary sanitation workers properly,” he said. “In our case, we use local revenue to show them as part-time staff and pay them Rs 150-200 per day. But this is not possible everywhere. Poorer panchayats cannot afford it, which is why some fake MGNREGS records. If panchayats have a separate income, sanitation workers can be paid; if not, the government budget alone won’t cut it.” 

Jumping hoops

Assistant Director of the Rural Development Department in Tiruppur, Balasubramaniam, said that the villagers continue to work as temporary sanitation workers since MGNREGS can only provide 100 days of work per year. The sanitation worker job allows the villagers to secure an income year-round, even if it is as little as Rs 5,000 per month.

He, however, said that under the state’s Solid Waste Management Scheme, sanitation workers are allowed to keep 75% of the earnings from selling plastic and scrap metal collected in their villages. “That is a source of extra income for these workers,” he said. Several workers interviewed by 101Reporters, however, said that the amounts earned through these scrap sales are minimal and have to be shared across the teams. 

When 101Reporters contacted IAS officer Gagandeep Singh Bedi, Secretary of Rural Development and Additional Chief Secretary to the Government of Tamil Nadu, on the issue of temporary sanitation workers, he declined to comment. Despite repeated follow-ups, no response was received from him. [101Reporters/VS]

This article is republished from 101 Reporters under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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