Be liberal in paying ex-gratia to kin of scavengers, HC tells GHMC

HYDERABAD: The Telangana High Court asked the state government, GHMC and municipalities not to be rigid when evaluating compensation and other benefits to families of people who had died while manually cleaning septic tanks and manholes.

A division bench, comprising Chief Justice Bhuyan and Justice Chada Vijay Bhaskar Reddy was responding to the GHMC’s stand that it was only liable to pay compensation to such families and was not responsible for incidents that occur in private premises.

The bench was hearing a long-pending PIL on the issue of survey, identification and rehabilitation of workers involved in manual cleaning of sewerage drains.

The Supreme Court while dealing with ‘Safai Karmchari Andolan’ had directed all municipal corporations and panchayats to conduct surveys in cities and districts for enumeration of sewerage workers so that they can be eligible for rehabilitation. Based on these directions, the Telangana High Court had earlier directed compliance of the apex court orders.

On Thursday, Vasudha Nagaraj, counsel for the petitioner, brought to the notice of the court that Telangana was yet to undertake the survey. She also referred to the GHMC stand that compensation would be paid only to those workers who died while cleaning drains in public places as opposed to those who cleaned drains at the instance of private parties. The GHMC in its counter stated that the state was not liable to pay compensation.

The bench observed that compensation should be paid irrespective of whether the deceased had entered a public or a private drain. It advised the state government not to turn it into adversarial litigation.

The corporation’s standing counsel sought time to respond to the queries posed by the court, which posted it for detailed hearing on September 7.