‘There is no such thing as professional grief’

Each time I attempt to pen the deaths of my people, my mind empties out, like breath leaving the body of a corpse.

The world around us has advanced so much yet our society pays no heed to the lives of manual scavengers. The government simply denies the occurrence of these deaths, but in a response to a question in the Lok Sabha this year, the Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, Ramdas Athawale shared data showing that there have been more than 377 deaths from 2019-2023 "due to hazardous cleaning of sewers and septic tanks".

I have personally attended an innumerable number of manhole deaths in the last seven years. In Avadi, Chennai district alone, there have been 12 manhole deaths since 2022.

On August 11, Hari, a 25-year-old Avadi resident and member of the Arunthathiyar community who was working as a contract labourer drowned while cleaning a sewage canal.

Twelve days later I went to report on the death of Hari anna. I found his body lying inside a freezer box in his home. His wife Tamil Selvi had been asked by her family to finally carry out all the rituals a widow is expected to do. Her neighbours’ relatives smeared turmeric all over her then bathed her before cutting off her thali [symbol of a married woman]. She remained solemn and silent during these rituals.

When she moved to another room to change her clothes, the entire place was filled with silence. Their house built with just the red bricks had not been cemented. Each and every exposed brick was crumbling and eroded. The house seemed to be at the verge of collapsing.

When Tamil Selvi akka came back after changing her saree, she ran towards the freezer box with a scream and began crying and wailing as she sat next to the freezer box. Her cries silenced the crowd and filled the room.

“Oh dear! Wake up! Look at me, maama [term of endearment]. They are making me wear a saree. You don’t like it when I wear sarees, right? Wake up and ask them to not force me.”

These words echo within me even today. Tamil Selvi akka is physically challenged having lost an arm. It is difficult for her to pin the pleats of the saree end on to her shoulder. That is why she doesn’t wear sarees. This memory stays and haunts me every day.

Every such death that I’ve attended has stayed within me.

Behind each and every manhole death many stories lie hidden. Deepa, aged 22, who also lost her husband Gopi in the recent manhole deaths at Avadi questioned whether 10 lakh rupees as compensation will cover the loss of her family's joy and happiness. “The 20th of August is our wedding day and 30th of August is our daughter's birthday, and he has left us in the same month as well,” she said. The monetary compensation they receive doesn’t meet all their financial needs.

Women and children of families who face manhole deaths are often not considered as victims. In Madampattu village in Villupuram district, when Anushiya akka’s husband, Maari died in a manhole, she couldn’t let out a cry as she was eight months pregnant. The couple already had three daughters; the first two daughters cried but their third daughter who couldn’t comprehend what was happening was running around the house in this eastern edge of Tamil Nadu.

State compensation is seen as blood money. “I’m just unable to bring myself to spend this money. Spending this feels like gulping down my husband’s blood,” Anushiya akka said.

When I followed up with the family of Balakrishnan, a manual scavenger who died in Karur district, Tamil Nadu, I observed that his wife suffers from serious depression. She said that even while working she often forgets her surroundings. It takes her time to realise her state, she said.

The lives of these families get turned upside down. To us, however, these deaths are nothing more than news.

On September 11, 2023, Moses, a sanitary worker from Bheema Nagar in Avadi passed away. His is the only house with a tiled roof. Both of his daughters were able to comprehend the situation. I was at their house a day before his body arrived and his daughters were wearing tee-shirts that said ‘Dad loves me’ and ‘Dad’s little princess’. I was unsure if it was a coincidence.

They spent the entire day crying incessantly, and despite others consoling them they were not pacified.

Even though we may attempt to document and therefore mainstream these issues, there is a tendency to treat these deaths as merely news.

Two years ago in Kanjipattu, a hamlet in Sriperumbudur, three sanitary workers – Naveen Kumar, aged 25, Thirumalai aged 20 and Ranganathan aged 50, passed away. Thirumalai was newly married, and Ranganathan is a father of two children. A number of workers who die are newly married and it is heart-breaking to see their widows losing hope. A few months after her husband died, others threw a baby shower for Muthulakshmi,.

Manual scavenging is an illegal act in our country. Yet, we are unable to reduce the number of manhole deaths. I have no idea as to how I should take this issue further. My writing and photographs are the only way I know through which I hope to put a stop to this atrocious act.

Each and every one of these deaths’ taxes me heavily. I often question whether it is okay for me to cry or not at their funerals. There is no such thing as professional grief. It is always personal. However, if not for these deaths I wouldn’t have become a photographer. To stop yet another manhole death, what more should I do? What should we all do?