NEW DELHI: After a rap from the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW), the Municipal Corporation of Delhi has now prohibited the use of acid to clean public toilets. In the latest notification issued by the civic body, the agencies involved in maintaining public toilets have been directed to ensure an alternative toilet cleaning material is used in place of acid.
“The provision for penalty for not using acid for the cleaning purpose of toilets is hereby abolished,” the civic body’s statement read, citing the 2013 Supreme Court judgment in the ‘Laxmi vs Union of India’ - a landmark case, which prohibited over the counter sale of acid across India.
The move has come a month after the DCW flagged potential risks of using acid during an inspection by its chief Swati Maliwal. She had spotted 50 litres of acid kept in the open in a public toilet complex located in Daryaganj.
Maliwal has written to the MCD commissioner and sought action in the case. “The Commission was shocked to find acid, in such a huge quantity, lying in the open in the MCD toilet. This is illegal and extremely dangerous as anyone could have accessed this acid and used it for causing an acid attack,”
Maliwal had said. As per the commission’s enquiry, the MCD had not issued any guidelines to prevent the use of acid for cleaning public toilets. “They also informed that toilets are cleaned (by the agency) as per terms and conditions imposed upon them in the contract agreement by MCD. Further, they provided a copy of the contract agreement between MCD and the agency (Shri Ram Institute of Rural Development) for maintaining and operating the toilet,” stated an official release.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, there were 102 cases of acid attacks reported in India in 2022. Delhi is among the states where the majority of these cases were reported, the data said.