Human Rights Commission Issues Notices To Pune Police Commissioner and Maharashtra Chief Secretary On Four Deaths While Cleaning Septic Tank
Mubarak Ansari
New Delhi/Pune, 3rd March 2022: The National Human Rights Commission, (NHRC) has taken suo motu cognizance of media reports that four persons died due to suffocation while cleaning a septic tank at a residential building in LoniKalbhor area on the outskirts of Pune city on 2nd March 2022.
It has issued notices, returnable within four weeks, to the Chief Secretary, Government of Maharashtra and Police Commissioner, Pune to submit reports on the status of the case.
“The report should include the details of compensation paid or if not, show cause why it should not be recommended to be paid to the next of the keen of the four victims” the NHRC stated in a press release.
The Commission has also asked the details of the case registered, if any, against those who engaged them for sewage cleaning without providing adequate safety equipment.
The Commission has observed that despite laws and Supreme Court judgment, every other day, deaths in sewage cleaning are being reported from various parts of the country due to the lack of safety equipment, which is tantamount to violation of human rights. It is completely unwarranted that the poor people die for their livelihood due to a lackadaisical attitude on the part of the authorities. There is a need for strong commitment on part of the state authorities, which is lacking, to save these lives.
On 2nd March around 10.30 am, two workers initially went inside the septic tank of the building near Hotel Pyasa in Kadamwakwasti for cleaning but when they started crying for help, the two others also went in. However, they were all asphyxiated.
The deceased persons have been identified as Padmakar Maruti Waghmare (36), Sikandar alias Dada Popat Kasbe (44), Krishna Datta Jadhav (25) and Rupchand Navnath Kamble (35), all residents of Kadamvakavasti, Loni Kalbhor. Jadhav hailed from Solapur district while Kamble was from Osmanabad district.
Based on the complaint from Waghmare’s wife Rajnandini (26), an FIR has been registered against the house owner Bhimaji Jaisingh Kalbhor.
According to police, Waghmare worked as a watchman at MIT College in Loni Kalbhor. He lived with his wife Rajnandini and two children on rent in a room owned by Kalbhor.
“My husband had come home after night duty and he was sleeping. Room owner Kalbhor had come looking for him but I asked him not to wake up my husband as he had returned after the night shift. He said that some workers are coming to clean the septic tank and left. I also went to drop my son off at his school. When I returned, a crowd had gathered outside our house”, Rajnandini stated in her complaint.
She further said, “I learnt that contractor Kamble had brought the workers Kasbe and Jadhav to clean the septic tank. After the workers started suffocating, Kamble went inside to save them. Room owner Kalbhor forced my husband to go inside the tank to save them. Another person got into the tank and brought out my unconscious husband. We took them to a nearby private hospital where he was declared dead on arrival. The bodies of other workers were taken out by the fire brigade.”
Police has registered the case for offences under sections 304a (causing death due to negligence) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and relevant sections of the Employment as Manual Scavengers Act.
