Bengaluru: The recent remarks by Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) Minister Krishna Byre Gowda, questioning the demand for permanent employment by Pourakarmikas, have triggered a larger debate over the working conditions, caste history and rights of sanitation workers.
The controversy goes beyond a minister’s criticism of workers. It raises fundamental questions about who is expected to clean a rapidly expanding city, under what conditions they work, who is responsible for the waste they handle and whether their rights can be made conditional on fulfilling duties that society has historically assigned to particular communities.
Pourakarmikas constitute a major part of Bengaluru’s sanitation workforce, with many belonging to Dalit communities and a significant number being women. Their official designation may sound neutral — Poura meaning civic or city and karmika meaning worker — but the nature of the work continues to carry the burden of a deeply entrenched caste history.
Minister’s remarks spark controversy
A video of Krishna Byre Gowda interacting with sanitation workers involved in garbage transportation recently went viral. In the interaction, workers reportedly sought regularisation of their employment.
Gowda responded by questioning why workers should be made permanent when, according to him, some were not attending work regularly.
“Why should we make you permanent when you are not even interested in coming for work?” he said, while urging the workers to first demonstrate their willingness to work.
He also questioned whether workers were faithfully performing their duties and referred to the city’s garbage problem while criticising their demand for permanency.
The remarks drew support from some sections, including Biocon founder Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, who said Pourakarmikas needed to demonstrate “responsible workmanship” and linked permanent employment to maintaining cleanliness.
But critics argue that such statements shift attention away from the structural problems within Bengaluru’s waste-management system and place the burden of a systemic failure on the workers who perform its most difficult tasks.
A caste occupation given a new name
Under the Karnataka Municipal Corporations Act, 1976, a Pourakarmika is defined as a person employed in collecting or removing filth, cleaning drains or slaughterhouses, or driving carts used for removing filth, excluding night soil.
The terminology may have changed over the years, but the social composition and nature of sanitation work have not changed to the same extent.
For centuries, particular communities were compelled to perform sanitation and waste-related occupations as hereditary caste duties. The modern designation of Pourakarmika was intended to provide a more dignified official identity, but a change in terminology cannot by itself erase the social stigma attached to the occupation.
In Bengaluru, sanitation workers continue to deal with mixed and often hazardous waste. Despite legal safeguards and waste-management rules, workers can still be exposed to rotting garbage, animal carcasses and other dangerous material.
This happens partly because waste segregation at source remains inadequate and citizens and establishments frequently fail to comply with their own responsibilities.
Who is responsible for Bengaluru’s waste?
The question of accountability cannot end with the sanitation worker.
The Solid Waste Management Rules, 2026 place clear responsibilities on waste generators. Among other requirements, they mandate segregation and storage of waste at source in four streams — wet waste, dry waste, sanitary waste and special-care waste — before handing it over to authorised waste pickers or collectors as directed by local authorities.
If households, commercial establishments and institutions do not segregate their waste, sanitation workers are left to deal with the consequences.
Mixed waste can contain food waste, broken glass, sanitary material, biomedical waste and other hazardous substances. Asking workers to handle such waste manually while simultaneously questioning their commitment to work ignores the responsibility of waste generators and the failures of the larger system.
The worker’s role should be to collect and transport properly segregated waste. They should not be treated as a substitute for a functioning waste-management system.
Contract system raises larger questions
Another major issue concerns the employment structure of Pourakarmikas.
While some categories of sanitation workers, particularly sweepers, have been regularised, drivers and helpers associated with garbage vehicles have largely remained under contractual arrangements.
Critics of the system have long alleged that the contract model creates opportunities for corruption and the diversion of public funds.
One allegation is that contractors show a larger number of workers on official records than are actually employed and appropriate the wages and benefits associated with the fictitious workers. There have also been allegations concerning the non-payment or diversion of Employees’ State Insurance (ESI) and Provident Fund (PF) contributions.
These are matters that require proper investigation and accountability. But they also demonstrate why workers themselves should not be made responsible for weaknesses in the contracting system.
If public money is being siphoned off through irregular contracts, the appropriate targets of scrutiny are the officials, contractors and political networks responsible for administering those contracts.
Workers face serious health risks
Sanitation work is inherently hazardous, particularly when workers are required to handle waste manually.
Pourakarmikas can face musculoskeletal problems, back and joint pain, respiratory illnesses and other health complications associated with prolonged exposure to unhygienic working conditions.
Their vulnerability is increased when they lack adequate protective equipment, healthcare, rest days and basic workplace facilities.
Official committees, including the IPD Salappa Committee report of 1976 and the Chandrashekar Committee report of 2013, have highlighted problems concerning the working and living conditions of sanitation workers.
Yet the debate often centres on whether workers are performing their duties adequately rather than on whether the State and citizens are fulfilling their obligations towards the people who keep the city functioning.
COVID lockdown highlighted their importance
The contradiction became especially visible during the COVID-19 pandemic.
While large sections of the workforce shifted to working from home, sanitation workers continued to report for duty. They had to collect and handle waste while the city was under lockdown and residents were being urged to minimise physical contact.
Their work was essential to maintaining public health.
Yet sanitation workers have also routinely faced social discrimination from the very households whose waste they collect.
Reports of workers being denied drinking water, being asked to remain away from house entrances and being spoken to disrespectfully point to a social hierarchy that survives even when the occupation itself is officially given a more respectable name.
The experience of sanitation workers during the pandemic demonstrated that their labour is considered essential when the city needs them, but their dignity is not always treated as equally essential.
Ambedkar’s warning remains relevant
The debate also touches upon a larger ideological question concerning the distinction between rights and duties.
B R Ambedkar repeatedly challenged caste systems that assigned duties and occupations according to birth. His critique of caste was not merely about social discrimination but also about a system that divided people into hereditary occupations and placed unequal burdens on different communities.
Historical systems such as the jajmani arrangement institutionalised relationships in which lower-caste communities provided services to dominant castes in return for remuneration, often in kind.
Ambedkar documented the experience of the Balai community in Madhya Pradesh, where members were subjected to caste-imposed obligations and expected to perform services under terms dictated by dominant-caste groups.
Such historical examples are relevant because they demonstrate how the language of “duty” can become oppressive when applied unequally.
A worker’s constitutional rights cannot depend on whether society considers that person sufficiently dutiful.
Rights cannot be conditional on caste expectations
The Constitution abolished untouchability and guarantees equality before law. Labour legislation and welfare measures have subsequently sought to provide workers with protections relating to wages, social security, safety and dignity.
The demand for regularisation therefore cannot simply be dismissed as workers seeking benefits without responsibility.
Workers can certainly be held accountable for absenteeism or misconduct through lawful employment procedures. But accountability must apply equally across the system.
A contractual sanitation worker cannot be blamed for unsegregated waste dumped by households, inadequate infrastructure provided by civic authorities or corruption within the contracting system.
Nor should regular employment be presented as a reward for fulfilling a caste-associated occupation.
Sanitation workers have a history of resistance
The struggle of sanitation workers for dignity and better working conditions is not new.
Sanitation workers in Calcutta organised in the 1920s under unions that demanded recognition, better wages, housing, sanitation facilities, medical treatment, an end to corruption and paid leave.
Sanitation workers in Madras Corporation also went on strike in 1924, demanding better wages and basic provisions.
In Karnataka, Pourakarmika unions have fought for decades against the contract system and for regularisation. The State eventually accepted regularisation for sweepers, while the question of drivers and helpers remained unresolved.
These struggles show that sanitation workers have never been merely passive recipients of government policy. They have organised, negotiated and fought for recognition of their labour.
Bengaluru needs a rights-based waste policy
The current controversy offers an opportunity to reconsider Bengaluru’s approach to sanitation.
Instead of asking workers to prove their worth before receiving job security, the GBA and the State government need to examine the entire waste-management chain.
That includes enforcing segregation at source, ensuring mechanised handling of hazardous waste, providing protective equipment, guaranteeing weekly holidays and leave, ensuring timely wages and social-security contributions, and investigating irregularities in contractual arrangements.
Basic amenities such as drinking water and toilets at workplaces must also be guaranteed.
The contractors handling public sanitation services must face transparent scrutiny, while workers should have accessible mechanisms to report violations without fear of losing employment.
Most importantly, sanitation workers must be treated as workers with rights rather than as a caste-defined workforce whose labour is taken for granted.
Bengaluru’s garbage problem cannot be solved by humiliation or by invoking “duty”. It requires accountable civic administration, responsible waste generation, scientific waste management and dignified employment.
The people who clean the city deserve the same dignity and constitutional protection as everyone else. Their right to decent work, fair wages, social security and humane conditions cannot be made conditional on the performance of a historically imposed caste occupation.