One Died and Two Others Severely Injured While Cleaning Sewer in Delhi’s New Friends Colony

One worker died and two others were hospitalised during maintenance work on a Delhi Jal Board (DJB) pipe in the new Friends colony area of the national capital region, last week. Police said that the three men lost consciousness after they manually started to clean the pipeline.

Responding to the incident, the Delhi Jal board, however, said that these men “were neither DJB regular staff, not DJB contractual staff.” 

DJB’s Responsibility or Not

A Delhi Jal board official told national media that “… yesterday i.e. on 16.03.2025 (Sunday), evening, three persons enter a DJB sewer manhole… The site has been inspected today… And it is observed that these three persons were neither DJB regular staff nor DGP contractual staff. This was the unauthorised access into DJB manhole and there was ongoing work regarding the cleaning of sewer on Sunday…” 

Preliminary investigation by the police indicates that workers inside the manhole were carrying out maintenance work. They lost consciousness most likely due to toxic fumes or lack of oxygen.

In the matter, a case has been registered under Section 105 of the Bharathiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and Sections 7 and 9 of the Manual Scavenging Act.=

A total of 94 people have died while cleaning sea lines inside Delhi, in the past 15 years. Out of these deaths, only one has acquired justice.