NEW DELHI: The Delhi government on Friday approached the high court here against an order of a single judge directing it to pay enhanced compensation of Rs 30 lakh to the widow of a sanitation worker who died while manual scavenging in 2017.
The Delhi government’s standing counsel Santosh Kumar Tripathi told a bench headed by Acting Chief Justice Manmohan that the widow was paid Rs 10 lakh
compensation the same month her husband died as per the then mandate.
Therefore the Supreme Court decision which subsequently increased the compensation payable to the dependents of the victims of manual scavenging to Rs 30 lakh would not apply to her, the counsel said.
The bench, also comprising Justice Manmeet PS Arora, issued notice to the widow on the government’s appeal but asked the authorities to pay her the enhanced compensation in six weeks.
Tripathi argued that since the compensation amount comes from the public exchequer, the issue must be given quietus once payment is done as per the applicable mandate as payment of enhanced compensation even to those who have already received indemnity as per the applicable mandate would open a pandora’s box.
The court said, “You pay the amount in this case, we will see. Without prejudice to their rights and contentions, the appellant is directed to pay the enhanced amount within six weeks.”
Observing that manual scavengers have lived in bondage, systematically trapped in inhuman conditions for a long time, the Supreme Court in October 2023 asked the Centre and state governments to eradicate manual scavenging across the country.
While passing a slew of directions for the benefit of people involved in manual scavenging, it had asked the central and state governments to pay Rs 30 lakh as compensation to the next of kin of those who die while cleaning sewers.
The Supreme Court has ordered that compensation for sewer-related deaths be raised to Rs. 30 lakhs from the previous Rs. 10 lakhs, adjusted for inflation since 1993.
A single-judge ruling on November 23 supported this decision, directing a state government to apply it to a case involving a worker who died of suffocation from poisonous gases in a sewer on August 6, 2018.
The deceased worker’s widow had received Rs. 10 lakh but requested an increase to Rs. 30 lakh, in line with the Supreme Court’s directive.