Two sanitation workers died of asphyxiation while cleaning a sewage line in Gujarat's Ahmedabad district, police said on Sunday.
The incident took place in Dholka town on Saturday evening, they said.
The two workers, identified as Gopal Padhar (24) and Bijal Padhar (32), fell unconscious after entering a sewage line to clean it. They were rushed to a hospital where doctors declared them dead, an official from Dholka police station said.
"The incident occurred at around 5 pm on Saturday when the duo entered the gutter line. They died of asphyxiation," the official said.
An FIR was registered at Dholka police station against contractors Ashiq Thakor and Jagdish Thakor under Indian Penal Code Section 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) as well as under relevant provisions of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, the official said.
The Gujarat government recently informed the Legislative Assembly that 11 sanitation workers died of asphyxiation while cleaning drains in different parts of the state during the last two years.
On Tuesday, an NGO moved a public interest litigation (PIL) in the Gujarat High Court seeking steps to prevent death of manhole workers and compensation to the families of all those who died while cleaning drainage lines or septic tanks.
The NGO Manav Garima claimed the government has not paid compensation to the families of 26 out of 152 manhole workers who died between 1993 and 2014, and 16 workers who died after the filing of its main petition in 2016.
Despite section 7 of the Prohibition of Employment As Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act prohibiting local authorities or their agencies from engaging people for hazardous cleaning of sewer in underground drainage lines or septic tanks, they have continued to do so, causing several deaths, it said.
As many as 45 instances have taken place where 95 workers lost their lives while cleaning septic tanks, the PIL claimed.
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