As a 13-year-old, with an ailing mother, Anita started working as a manual scavenger - something her mother had done before her. For more than ten years that followed, she carried human waste from dry latrines.  She had contracted many infectious diseases from her work. At Rs10-15 a month per toilet, the pay was an insult to all that she endured.

She lived in Meerut's Raunakpura area, where most manual scavengers in the city lived in the fringes of a caste-ridden society. Her caste was so deeply entrenched in her life that  it closed all other employment possiblities for her (manual scavengers belong to the Valmiki caste, considered untouchable by dalits as well as other castes). She was made a pariah by the very people whose toilets she cleaned. It was routine for her husband Shambhu to concume alochol before going to work, as it was the only way he could bear the stench from the latrines.]

However, Anita's is also a story of change - and hope. She is one of the thousands of women all over the country who rejected the practice of manual scavenging and went for alternative career options.

In August 2009, she got in touch with Safai Karamchari Andolan (SKA)- an organisation working for the eradication of manual scavenging from India. She gave her details to the SKA volunteers. They convinced her to discontinue the practice and arranged an alternative career for her.

Anita, along with more than 300 former manual scavengers from across the country was in the capital on Monday to declare what they called ‘liberation from the inhuman practice of manual scavenging.’

“The community has to come out and speak that they have given up this practice. Otherwise the society will not believe that manual scavenging still exists and that we are fighting for it to stop,” said Bejwada Wilson of SKA.

Manual scavenging is banned under the eradication of manual scavenging and dry latrine (abolition) act 1993. However, most of the states are yet to implement the ban on the ground.

In December 2003, SKA filed a petition asking for the state and central governments to implement the act.

“Initially, the states did not submit the affidavits as directed by the court. The supreme court summoned seven principal secretaries asking them to take cognizance of the case. In the affidavits submitted, all of them denied that manual scavenging existed in their jurisdiction,” said Wilson.