Latabai’s waste full life in Latur

Latabai is not entitled to even a day off in a week. She works every single day. In case she falls sick and takes leave, the contract company she works for charges her a penalty of Rs. 500 a day.

And Latabai is Latur city's award-winning waste picker.

“I am the only woman driver in Latur city. In 2011, I received the Latur Bhushan Award from our MLA Amit Deshmukh at the Latur Festival, for keeping the residential areas allocated to me clean,” she told PARI.

“Officials from the Municipal Corporation checked my zone, and they couldn’t find any dry or wet garbage. I was overwhelmed to receive the award in front of a large gathering and amongst the ministers and celebrities. I thought my struggle would then get recognised – little did I think then that this was just for a day,” she adds.

Latabai Rasal, 40, from Latur city of Maharashtra says, “I have been collecting trash in Latur since 2002”. That was the year her husband passed away. She was married seven years before when she was merely 15. Looking for a source of livelihood she took up waste picking to sustain herself and her five children.

“My struggle for wages continues even today. “I start my work at half past six in the morning. Firstly, going to the supervisor’s centre near Ausa Road in Latur where waste collection vehicles are parked. The supervisor then clicks our photo, along with the vehicle for our hajeri [attendance]. Then with the vehicle, I travel to the residential areas allocated to me for the garbage collection,” says Latabai. She travels five kilometres from her home everyday to reach the supervisor’s centre.

The weight capacity of Latabai’s collection vehicle is 200 kilograms. In order to collect trash from 1,000 houses, she has to empty the vehicle thrice. For a thousand households in Latur, the amount of waste collected is about 600 kilograms.

The city is divided into three residential zones for waste collection. Each zone has approximately 7 tonnes (7,000 kilograms) of garbage per day which is dumped into a larger vehicle near the signal camp area of the city. From there the trash is carried to Nangaon on the outskirts of Latur.

The Municipal Corporation of Latur city has attached a barcode to every house, and waste pickers must scan each time so that the corporation gets a confirmation of trash being collected. “Technology is making our lives worse. We only get our wages if we scan 1,000 barcodes a day. Sometimes our mobile phone ‘data’ is poor, so it takes a long time to scan the barcode,” says Latabai.

Latur’s waste pickers have always worked under contract. For the last two years, the contract has been with Ashok Enterprise in Mumbai. Before 2024, the contract was with Sanjay Kamble – a local activist from Latur.

Latabai says, “the last time we received our pagaar [monthly wage] was on December 26, 2025. Till today [February 6, 2026], we haven’t received our wages. If we say we will protest against this, the contractor’s people threaten us, saying that you will lose your job. We are scared of losing our jobs, so we do not question the authorities.”

The struggle continues even at home for Latabai. Pointing to her knee, she says, “the water-level is still here inside our house during the rainy season. My children used to fall sick every monsoon with high fever. In our kachcha ghar [loose brick house] – it is miserable when it rains.” Latabai tells this reporter that ahead of every municipal election, the local corporator promises to fix the houses, but post elections they disappear.

“I am a widow, yet I am not enrolled in Sanjay Gandhi Niradhar Yojana, Ladki Bahin Yojana or any other government scheme. Forget the schemes, I do not even receive ration although I have a kesari [saffron] ration card,” says Latabai.

Although she is entitled to the government schemes meant for women, there are middlemen in the process who ask for at least a thousand rupees to get the work done. “I have given money to many such people for different schemes, yet they keep asking for more and to go to a tehsil office myself I have to skip a workday for which I will incur a penalty,” she adds.

For the ration card middlemen ask for at least Rs. 500 extra to register the ration card online. Online registration for ration has now become mandatory in order to receive the monthly ration.

Handling waste everyday, workers like Latabai need to regularly use safety equipment. But she points out, “the hand gloves that the municipal corporation provides last for 15 days maximum and they only provide 2 or 3 pairs a year. How are we supposed to sustain them?”

Showing her mud-filled gloves, she says, “I picked these gloves from the trash. I use them now. Due to segregating the wet and dry waste without gloves for years now, my thumbprints have faded. For any official work if I need to press my thumb, my thumbprint is not recognised.”

In Maharashtra, Latur is included in Tier-3 cities along with Akola, Baramati, Satara, Sangli, and others in terms of growing economies. In terms of population, it is 19th in rank, at about 0.26 million while the most populous city in Maharashtra, Mumbai is 11.9 million.

“The award I got from the corporation in 2011 brought me Rs. 75,000 – which I spent on purchasing a waste collection vehicle,” she told PARI.

The vehicle is a small, motorised three-wheeler with a teal-blue metal body and an open cargo area at the back. Latabai thought that she could have her own vehicle to drive and collect the trash in. The corporation, however, said that she cannot get wages for both driving and collection. She can get paid only for one of the two. She was unaware of that when she bought the vehicle.

“So, I was forced to have a different driver for my vehicle,” Latabai explains. She chose to be a waste picker rather than a driver of her own vehicle because of the difference in the wage rate. Garbage collection brings her around Rs.12,000 a month. The wage for drivers is Rs. 7,000 a month. Latabai earns an additional Rs. 1,000 and a compensatory amount for the fuel expenses a month for her vehicle from the contract company. She works for about 11 hours everyday, from 6.30 a.m. to 5.30 p.m.

As of July 1, 2025, the minimum monthly wage for sweepers and scavengers (waste workers) in Maharashtra for Zone-2 cities is Rs. 16,584 a month according to the Maharashtra Minimum Wage 2025 report. Latabai’s monthly income including the additional money she gets for using her vehicle comes to just Rs. 13,000 which is about 22 per cent less than the minimum wage cited in the report.

On the backs of about 600 workers like Latabai, Latur clinched one of the major awards for solid waste management in 2024-25. Latabai says, “Yes, the Corporation received the award. There were rumours spread that we all received a lot of money after the award, but we didn’t receive a single paisa.”

The daily wage for garbage collection works out to about Rs. 400. But the penalty for taking leave even for a single day, is 25 per cent higher at Rs. 500. It seems like the corporation wants to clean up any little savings from their waste workers if they ever fall sick and take leave.