The Supreme Court has issued contempt notices to the Chief Secretaries of five states in cases of deaths due to manual scavenging. In the notice, the court has asked why contempt action should not be initiated against them for failing to prevent deaths due to manual scavenging. Supreme Court directed everyone to file affidavit within 4 weeks
Dr. Balram had filed a petition in the Supreme Court to stop manual scavenging and dangerous sewer cleaning. The Supreme Court, while hearing this petition, said that despite the decision of October 20, 2023 and the instructions given thereafter, deaths are occurring during cleaning of sewers and septic tanks. In view of this, the court issued contempt notices to the Chief Secretaries of five states. Earlier, in October 2023, the Supreme Court had directed to end this practice and increased the compensation amount for sewer-related deaths to ₹30 lakh.
46 deaths in 2025 and 54 deaths in 2024
After this, the court had completely banned manual scavenging and sewer cleaning in six metros. On Monday, the bench of Justice Arvind Kumar and Justice Vipul M. Pancholi heard the case on the basis of the progress made so far. Senior Advocate K. Parmeshwar (amicus curiae) said that despite the 2023 decision and subsequent instructions, deaths are taking place. According to the data presented in response to a ‘starred question’ in Parliament, there were 46 deaths in 2025 and 54 in 2024.
Instructions to file affidavit within 4 weeks
Talking about specific states, he said that in 2024, there were 17 deaths in Maharashtra, 12 in Tamil Nadu and 13 in Rajasthan. Other states also include Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh. The bench of Supreme Court Justices Arvind Kumar and Vipul M Pancholi has sent contempt notices to the Chief Secretaries of the governments of Bihar, Delhi, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Supreme Court directed everyone to file affidavit within 4 weeks
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