With the help of two small wooden boards, two young men — both in their early 20s — pick lumps of human excreta spread around a defunct public toilet. They then dispose the waste in a gutter nearby.

Their wages for cleaning human faeces? Rs. 162 a day.

Morning signifies a fresh start to the day. But for several workers like the youthful duo engaged in manual scavenging, it is the filthiest part.

“We do all kinds of work. Today we have been assigned this work. If we object, we would simply be taken off duty. Yes, we feel disgusted, but what can we do?” says Arvind Karsanbhai, hired as a contract worker by the Surendranagar municipal body.

Arvind and his co-worker Jayesh Janat belong to the Scheduled Caste Valmiki community, traditionally engaged in manual scavenging. A law banning the practice in 1993 and subsequent court judgments have not changed the lot of these Dalits, who like their ancestors, continue in the same occupation. They are either hired by local bodies as ‘safai karamcharis’ (sanitary workers) through contractors or employed as daily wagers by private persons.

The Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, prohibits anyone from engaging manual scavengers directly or indirectly.Defunct latrine

The sanitation at Surendranagar’s Popatpara area is dismal. A defunct and dilapidated latrine with no running water serves an entire residential locality. A water pump provided by the civic body is not operational. Women have no choice but to use the insanitary facility, while men and children defecate in the open. The faeces are cleaned by the conservancy workers as part of their daily duty.

Says Mayaben (name changed as she is too afraid to disclose it), roughly in her fifties, “I have been doing this cleaning work even before my first child was born.”In Khambhlav village in Limdi taluk, about 30 kilometres from Surendranagar town, 16-year-old Jaya has joined the family occupation after dropping out from school. “I don’t like the work, but have to do it,” she remarks.

Her 14-year-old brother Kodidas is the only child in his class to do manual scavenging work.

His day begins at 6 a.m. In metal baskets, he collects human and animal faeces and dead cats and dogs. After finishing work, he attends school at 10.30 am.

His father Nathabhai Kabira says, “I have to take the children along. I have 10 clients, each owning around 10 cattle. So I have to clear the dung of nearly 80 cattle per day.” For their work, the Kabira family makes paltry sums of Rs. 500 to 2,000 per year, besides food and hand-me-down clothes, given by the employers.

According to activist Natubhai Parmar of the NGO Navsarjan Trust, there are around 400 manual scavengers in Surendranagar alone. However, the government denies this.

“No such activity is going on,” says Surendranagar Collector K.B. Bhatt.

K.M. Vanani, Chief Officer, Surendranagar-Dudhrej Nagarpalika says, “This is a wrong interpretation of manual scavenging. Workers clean with water using a water tanker. The practice was abolished in 1976 itself. Under the Nirmal Gujarat scheme we are going to build 7,000 individual toilets.”

In 2004, points out Mr. Parmar, the State submitted an affidavit in court saying there were no manual scavengers. However in 2007, in response to his RTI application, the Social Justice and Empowerment department pegged their figure at 64,195.

“We have shown photographs and videos to no avail. The government also denied the findings of its own survey team from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences. It refused to share the TISS report under RTI,” he says.