Chinta Devi is a victim of the hidden apartheid of India. She is a manual scavenger and so are her family members. All through her life in the Meherpur locality of Uttar Pradesh, she has been subjected to life in a ghetto on the outskirts of the village. As she went on to start her own family her children were subjected to socially exclusionary practises at school and never received the proper education that they deserved. Her husband is confined to prison being under trial for a crime that he did not commit. Medical poverty has plagued her family with a disproportionately high prevalence and exposure to the most virulent forms of viral and bacterial infections that affect their skin, eyes, limbs, respiratory and gastrointestinal systems. Tuberculosis is rife in the community. Chinta Devi has no other source of income, while some others among her community have one extra bread-earner in their families. But this extra source of income is not permanent as they work on daily wages and their per-day income varies from Rs 20 to Rs 50. The day of these women starts at 5 am and most of them continue it up to 11 am without having any meal. It was also found that some scavengers have tried to challenge their social and economic status by changing their jobs. But finally, they have to return to their original profession because of a social boycott and the lack of support from both private and governmental agencies. The law and order machinery has also proved inefficient. For example, Chinta Devi started her shop with a loan arranged by a local NGO and left this menial job. But later she resumed this humiliating job as she faced a severe boycott even by her own community.
(A) It is also because of this element that the scavengers are constrained to remain in this status. Are the scavengers doomed to remain satisfied with their lifestyle?
(B) As a country, we have sworn to assure a life of dignity and personal liberty to all its citizens. We are failing the manual scavengers. If you were the district magistrate in Meherpur, how would you champion the cause of women like Chinta Devi?