It was a cold winter night when I woke up around five in the morning to catch the early morning bus to return to my university in Jamshoro, after staying at my home in Mithi, Tharparkar, for a few days. My mum always gets up early to make my breakfast. After all this, when I stepped out of the house to catch the bus, I heard the familiar sound of someone cleaning the road with a broom.

There was no sign of sunrise, yet this is a routine of municipality sweepers to clean each road and street of the town before life starts as the day follows. They have done this early in the morning each day, and cleaned up all the drains of town from all the type of waste.

A sweeper’s family is one of the few in rural areas where each member of the household, on reaching adulthood, joins in various sanitation works either in the municipality or home service. Almost every house, even middle class families, hires a sweeper, typically female, for cleaning bathrooms and floors. Likewise, male sweepers do the same in various government and private sectors.

Sweepers who work in private homes don’t even get any weekly or monthly leave.

Whenever it is heavily raining, a sweeper’s job multiples. Though the municipality helps to clean main roads with water with modern machinery, the situation on the side streets presents the worst picture, causing sweepers to work even harder to make them free of polluted water.

Another thing worth mentioning is the health hazards they face. Due to continuous dust and unhygienic conditions, they are more prone to developing skin and respiratory ailments. They also develop diseases of the gastrointestinal system.

This service is undoubtedly the most significant in the world. Yet these people are treated lesser than all others and they even earn less. Despite giving this contribution to fulfil the supreme need of cleanliness, the whole community of sweepers is considered dirty. Most houses of the town are no-go areas for them whenever there is any ritual taking place to ‘ensure the occasion’s dignity’, despite the fact that the same sweeper is the source for the maintenance of dignity of their surrounding, at home or outside. They are given separate utensils to drink water if they feel thirsty during their work. They are not allowed to dwell in most areas, leading to them to setting up their separate residential colonies on the outskirts of the town.

No country progresses where there is discrimination among persons due to their profession. Each profession is worthy and sweeping in itself is a vital need of every society. It is time that their contribution is recognised and they are also considered respected members of society.

Published in Dawn, Young World, May 13th, 2017