Sewer death: CM meets kin of deceased labourer
Announces financial help of Rs 10 lakh and job to one member of family
NEW DELHI: Chief Minister of Delhi Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday, met the family of the deceased labourer who died while cleaning a drain in Wazirabad. He announced financial help of Rs 10 lakh to the family of the deceased. The Chief Minister also assured the family that one member from the family will be given a job. "A labourer died here while cleaning a drain. It is very sad and painful. Delhi Government has set a very stringent norm for cleaning of drains and sewers, but many times, some contractors & engineers violate the rule and ask the labourers to enter the drain or sewer without proper safety kit and all. This also prima facie looks like a similar case. We will take strong action against the contractor and the engineer involved in this," said the CM.
He also said that Delhi Government would give a financial help of Rs10 lakh and also provide job to one member of the family. I will myself take a meeting and ensure that the contractors or anyone don't violate the rules for cleaning of drains and sewer so that such incidents do not occur again. "The contractor has made several violations and action will be taken accordingly; we will also look into the role of the engineers," said CM Kejriwal. Delhi government has fixed norms for cleaning of drains & sewers. The cleaning has to be done with proper safety kit and other norms also have to be followed.
The sanitation worker died of suffocation after he entered a sewer to clean in north Delhi on Sunday, the police said. Deputy Commissioner of Police Nupur Prasad said a call was received at 3 p.m., reporting that a man had got stuck in a drain in Wazirabad area when he went to clean it. A team from the departments of fire, disaster management and National Disaster Report Force (NDRF) reached at the spot for hours to locate the sanitation worker.
According to data collected by NGO Safai Karmachari Andolan, more than 200 sanitation workers have died since January 2017. In October last year, a 32-year-old died labourer while cleaning a sewer in northwest Delhi's Jahangirpuri. Another five men had
died while cleaning a sewer at a residential area in West Delhi's Moti Nagar area in September. Subsequently, the NHRC
had asked the Delhi chief secretary and the police commissioner to submit a detailed report on the death of the five sewage cleaners.
Dikshit demands probe
NEW DELHI: Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president Sheila Dikshit on Wednesday sought an enquiry into the death of a labourer Kishan Lal, with the Flood Irrigation Department of the Delhi Government, who died while desilting a supplementary drain at Wazirabad, so that such incidents do not occur in future.
Dikshit visited the residence of the labourer to meet his wife and children at Sriram Basti, near Gandhi Vihar, opposite Wazirabad, Outer Ring Road, and expressed her sorrow at the tragedy in the presence of a large number of local people and promised help on behalf of the Delhi Congress.
Sheila Dikshit said, "It was very sad that neither the Delhi Chief Minister nor the higher officials of the Delhi Government enquired about the family for two days, and Kejriwal met the family of the labourer in a hurry only when he came to know about her proposed visit to the residence of the late labourer," said Dikshit.
