VIJAYAWADA: It’s 7.30 am. Mani Kumar, dressed in a torn jeans and sporting a tattered baniyan, waits for his colleague, Ramu, to bring him a patti (vessel), standing bang in the middle of a junction at Bavajipeta (Vijayawada). The residential colony is just about waking up, but neither pedestrians nor commuters spare more than a cursory look at the 5-foot-6 figure, or his mate.
“I wanted to be an engineer... scored 60 per cent in SSC,” Mani says with a wry smile, folding up his jeans. Drawing up building plans or toggling a keyboard in an air-conditioned office are now far off his mind. Ramu is back, armed with a crowbar and holding a patti.
“Hold your breath and stand back!” Mani cautions as he and Ramu open the manhole. The duo too stand back for five minutes as the fresh morning air turns nauseating with the thick foul smell emanating from the black hole. “See, these gases are dangerous. Ramu, give me your match box,” Mani gestures. A habitual smoker, Ramu quickly pulls out one from his pocket. Mani lights a match stick and throws it down the manhole. Instantly, the fumes flare up in flashing bright blue and yellow, and get extinguished just as quickly.
“This is how dangerous the gases in these manholes are. My contractor does not provide safety gear. I have to remove broken glass bottles, syringes, and even fight aggressive rodents down there,” Mani explains as he undresses himself down to his underwear to get into the manhole. It could be about 10 feet deep. While Ramu lowers a pressure pipe into it, Mani gingerly dives in, after taking a deep breath.
The muck comes almost to the level of his nose. With one hand, Mani holds the other end of the pipe and revolves it around while Ramu holds it standing outside. After a few minutes, Mani lets go of the pipe and takes a quick dive, completely disappearing into the sewage. With his bare hands, he clears the dirt clogging the manhole and emerges in a few seconds.
Mani’s day usually begins at 5 am. He has to report for duty at the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation’s circle-II office near Alankar Theatre by 8 am. It’s his habit to seek his mother’s blessings and hug his son every day before stepping out. The 25-year-old got married in 2014 and last year, the couple were blessed with a baby boy. They named him Khyathi Teja. “I can’t hold him after returning from work.
The body odour is too much for a child. I have to play with him and cuddle him in the mornings only,” Mani rues, while preparing to take a bath after spending half-an-hour clearing the manhole. Forget safety gear like gloves, gumboots, and face masks, workers like Mani are not even given a soap or coconut oil — the latter is applied to the body in the belief that it wards off skin diseases. “We have to buy these ourselves. The VMC claims it is the contractor’s responsibility and the contractor passes the buck to the VMC.”
Mani gets back into his trademark jeans and baniyan but stands at a distance since he believes the body odour could cause discomfort to others. The problem has been so acute for him that he has stopped going home for the last one week. “Even my wife can’t stand this stench from my body. I myself can feel it.” Like many other workers, he has been suffering from respiratory problems too. For the last one month, he has been finding it difficult to breathe at times. For the last two weeks, his sputum has changed colour. “I don’t drink like my fellow workers or even smoke.”
It was in 2008 that he joined as underground drainage worker (UGD). He had no choice. He had been eagerly looking forward to join college after SSC results were out but as ill-luck would have it, his father, a lorry driver, expired during the holidays.
"My grandfather suggested that I join the municipality. He told me the corporation may regularise contract workers,” Mani recalls. None in his family is into this type of work but he had a sister and mother to look after. “Now, my sister is married,” the young man says proudly. Mani earns Rs 9,270 per month. “It is less than what a construction worker gets. Very often, the contractor pays our salaries once in two-three months.”