A sanitation worker and a civic body contractor died of suffocation while cleaning an underground drainage line in Gujarat's Rajkot on Tuesday. An officer of Malviya Police Station gave this information. The worker Mehul Mehda (24-year-old) went to clean the underground sewer in Samrat Industrial Area and fell unconscious after inhaling the fumes, he said. 

They said contractor Afzal Kukur(42 years) immediately entered the sewer to save Mehda, but he too fainted. Both were pulled out with the help of the fire department and taken to the civil hospital, where doctors declared them brought dead, the official said.

The sweeper was doing the work of regular cleaning of the sewer. suffocate Due to which he and the contractor died. Rajkot Municipal Corporation engineer H M Kotak said the civic body would investigate the incident. "A machine was being used for cleaning and while fitting the machine, the victim was inhaling poisonous gas," he said. We have got the exact details of how it happened. A machine was being used for cleaning and while fitting the machine, the victim was exposed to poisonous gas. We have got the exact details of how it happened. A machine was being used for cleaning and while fitting the machine, the victim was exposed to poisonous gas. We have got the exact details of how it happened. 

In the last two years, 11 sanitation workers died of suffocation while cleaning drains in different parts of the state. Gujarat's Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Bhanuben Babaria had told that seven of them died between January 2021 and January 2022 and four between January 2022 and January 2023.  

 

Their family got compensation of 10 lakh from yhe government. The minister also said that the state's urban local bodies and panchayats have been directed to strictly follow the provisions of the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013.