KARACHI: Rights activists on Friday demanded an immediate ban on manual sewer cleaning across Pakistan and called for an end to the “inhuman practice” that exposes sanitation workers to toxic gases, infections and the constant risk of death while drastically reducing their life expectancy.
They said such work must be replaced with mechanised sewer cleaning as it is done in civilised societies in the world.
The demand was made at a session held at the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) House after the screening of the short film Hellhole. The film portrayed the hazardous conditions in which sanitation workers continue to clean sewers by hand.
The film follows the life of Parvez Masih, a Christian sanitation worker who goes inside choked sewers without any protective equipment. He removes solid waste with his bare hands to earn a living for his family. The film highlights the dangers faced by such workers, including exposure to poisonous gases, infections and fatal accidents.
Hellhole, highlighting ‘inhuman’ practice of manual scavenging, screened at PMA House
Speaking at the session, rights activist Naeem Sadiq, a petitioner before the Sindh High Court against manual sewer cleaning, said the practice continues across Pakistan despite public institutions having substantial budgets, trained staff and machines. He said that government bodies largely rely on contractors, who employed workers from disadvantaged and marginalised communities, particularly Christians, to undertake hazardous cleaning without adequate safety measures.
Referring to the Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation (KWSC), he said the utility possessed sewer-cleaning machines and employed workers. Yet manual cleaning continued through outsourced workers. He alleged that while the corporation had informed the court that it relied on machinery and provided safety equipment whenever manual intervention became unavoidable, the situation on the ground was very different. He added that at least 22 sanitation workers had died in the past six months. Most of them, he said, were employed through private contractors.
PMA President Dr Ismail Memon said many public institutions lacked the machinery and protective equipment needed for safe sewer maintenance, due to which most people and to rely on such private workers. He also alleged that contractors recruit impoverished workers and often pay them wages below the legal minimum.
Senior lawyer and human rights activist Sara Malkani said manual sewer cleaning is not merely a labour issue. It is also a constitutional and human rights issue. She said a petition pending before the Sindh High Court sought a declaration that the practice was unconstitutional and should be treated as a criminal offence.
She referred to the deaths of three members of the same family in Karachi’s Usmanabad area after they entered a sewer one after another in an attempt to rescue each other. She alleged that the affected family received only a fraction of the compensation promised. Such incidents, she said, reflected a recurring pattern of neglect and exploitation.
Urban Resource Centre representative Zahid Farooq, who is also a petitioner in the case, said sanitation workers employed on daily wages by civic agencies continued to perform hazardous work for years without being regularised. He urged the authorities to end contractual exploitation and permanently employ eligible workers.
The participants unanimously adopted a resolution urging the federal and provincial governments to immediately abolish manual sewer cleaning, ensure the use of mechanised equipment, prosecute those responsible for forcing workers into hazardous conditions and provide compensation of at least Rs5 million to the families of workers who lose their lives while cleaning sewers.
Those who signed the resolution include the Concerned Citizens Alliance, Citizens for Change and Justice for the Voiceless, among others.
Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2026
