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Safai Karmachari
Andolan (SKA) is a national movement committed to the eradication of
manual scavenging and the liberation and rehabilitation of all such
safai karmacharis into dignified occupations. More specifically,
seeks ensure implementation of the Employment of Manual Scavengers
and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act 1993, penalising
offenders who continue to build dry latrines or employ persons for
manual scavenging. SKA advocates the complete abolition of manual
scavenging, demolition of all dry latrines and replacement with
water sealed or sanitary pit latrines, and the rehabilitation of all
persons engaged in manual scavenging. Concurrently, SKA aims to
organise and mobilise the safai karmachari community around the
issues of dignity and rights, as part of the process of their
rehabilitation and realisation of rights.
SKA was initiated in 1986 by several human rights activists who took
up the struggle against manual scavenging in Kolar Gold Fields,
Karnataka. SKA soon emerged in its present form as a
campaign-movement in 1996 Andhra Pradesh. By 2000, SKA had become a
strong movement in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamilnadu and had also expanded campaign gradualy to
the states of Maharashtra and Rajasthan.
Since then, it has grown progressively to become a National
Movement spread across sixteen states of India – Andhra Pradesh,
Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka,
Maharashtra, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand, and Uttarakhand –
with a national secretariat in New Delhi. In addition, SKA works in
collaboration with partner organisations in Chattisgarh,
Gujarat andMadhya Pradesh.
While focusing primarily on the rights of persons engaged in manual
scavenging, SKA is also committed to working with all those engaged
in ‘unclean’ occupations, such as pit or septic tank workers, sewage
workers and sweepers, who fall within the ambit of ‘safai
karmacharis’. Moreover, while acknowledging that mostly Dalits are
engaged in these ‘unclean’ occupations, SKA also works with other
communities such as Yanadis and Kattunayagars, who also engage in
these occupations in some areas of certain states.
SKA is one of the first organisations to organise women from the
safai karmacharis community to assert their right to a life with
dignity. Gender is a cross-cutting theme in most of SKA activities,
and SKA is committed to building women’s leadership within the safai
karmachari community.
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