CHENNAI: The Union Budget has “completely deceived” Safai Karmachari community. There is no mention of persons engaged in manual scavenging, in entire Budget, the Safai Karmachari Andolan (SKA) said.””Even the scheme meant for the rehabilitation of manual scavengers (SRMS) has been outragesously scrapped. This disappointing budget has once again demonstrated the clear apathy of union government towards Safai Karmacharis, especially the manual scvengers,” the Andolan said in a statement.The statement issued by Bezwadi Wilson, national convenor of SKA demanded Prime Minister Narendra Modi to come out with a white paper on work done by government for manual scavengers in the last 10 years. “He should also announce a special package for liberation and rehabilitation of manual scavengers,” Wislon added.Manual scavenging is still blatantly and illegally practised in many parts of the country, specifically in states like UP, MP, Bihar and J&K. Providing no budget allocation for the rehabilitation of manual scavengers simply means that this government has no intention to eradicate manual scavenging, and it has even refused to recognise manual scavengers as human beings. “This government has no respect for human life and human dignity,” the statement noted.
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