Sakshi Trust "RTI"

There were supposedly 61 MCD sweepers for keeping the streets and roads of A, B, C, D, S & J Blocks of Pandav Nagar in East Delhi clean. Not more than 35 of them are present on any working day. But almost all of them are marked present.

F1 & F2 Blocks of Sundernagari in East Delhi have 42 sweepers. Not more than 18 sweepers are present on any working day. Again, almost all of them are marked present.

This was discovered after the people of these two areas filed applications under the Right to Information Act and asked for copies of attendance registers of the sweepers.

The balance sweepers are employed elsewhere and almost never report for duty. But they are marked present by their Assistant Sanitary Inspector (ASI). For this favour, these sweepers share more than half of their salary with ASI. Some ASIs claim that this money is shared right upto the top. This is called Lahori system in MCD parlance.

After copies of attendance registers were received under Right to Information, the names of all the sweepers came to be known for the first time. Their identities were established. Earlier, the people did not know how many sweepers had been employed by the Municipality in their area. They would not know their working hours and their individual duties. But now the people could fix responsibilities.

This had an immediate impact. Suddenly, a number of new sweepers could be seen in the locality.