Cleanliness workers dive headfirst sans safety kits, urges Chennai Corpn for basic needs

CHENNAI: Regimes come and go, but the condition of the cleanliness workers continues to be bleak. From food to toxic waste, these workers are forced to handle it with their bare hands. This is an inhuman practice going unchecked in the capital city.

The Greater Chennai Corporation, the oldest municipality in the country, is yet to come to the new era as its frontline workers are forced to handle waste without gloves or safety gear.

In one of the busy roads at Egmore in ward 61, a team of cleanliness workers were separating plastics from the waste they had collected door-to-door before dropping them in the garbage bin. Thanks to the delay in supplying safety gear to ward offices from the zonal office, bare hands and no safety shoes are a common sight in several pockets of Chennai.

A cleanliness worker who had been collecting waste for 26 years, rued, "The government is treating us like orphans, no one is there to fight for our rights. We have been continuously exploited by the officials."

"We weren't given any safety and basic material for the job, not even anti-cut gloves, safety shoes and a mask to protect us from the infection," he fumed.

Another cleanliness worker, who is a permanent staff member of GCC, said, "We are handling every kind of waste, including medical, with our bare hands and putting our lives at stake, but the officials are not bothered about our working conditions. The medical checkups for sanitary staff are also not conducted regularly and most of us suffer from health issues"

When DT Next contacted a corporation official, he said cleanliness workers are given safety equipment (gloves, masks and other paraphernalia) every three months. But they had not received the stock from the head office last month.