The government in July 2023 rolled out the National Action for Mechanised Sanitation Ecosystem (NAMASTE), a ₹349.70 crore scheme aimed at ending hazardous sewer and septic tank cleaning practices and ensuring safety and dignity for sanitation workers.
Jointly implemented by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, the programme will run till 2025-26 and cover all 4,800-plus Urban Local Bodies (ULBs), officials said.
A key milestone of NAMASTE is the massive effort to identify and validate Sanitary Workers. As of August 2025, 84,902 Sewer and Septic Tank Workers (SSWs) have been validated across India, a step that formally recognizes their identities and entitles them to scheme benefits. Alongside this profiling, the scheme has rolled out 54,140 health insurance covers under Ayushman Bharat-PMJAY or equivalent state health schemes. These measures are reshaping both identity and inclusion for workers who often labored in anonymity without protections.
Safety interventions form the core of NAMASTE’s mission. To shield sanitation workers from life-threatening exposure, the scheme has distributed 45,871 Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) kits and 354 Safety Device Kits to Emergency Response Sanitation Units (ERSUs) throughout states and Union Territories. These provisions are coupled with severe operational reforms, mechanised cleaning, training, and safety protocols, to reduce direct contact with faecal matter and prevent the tragic deaths that have periodically occurred in septic tank operations.
Livelihood improvement is another foundational pillar. Through provisions under NAMASTE, 707 sanitation workers and their dependents have received capital subsidies amounting to ₹20.36 crore for sanitation-related equipment and enterprise projects. The scheme also organizes workshops, 1,089 of them so far, to educate about hazardous cleaning and safe practices, and it supports the transformation of workers into “Sanipreneurs,” enabling them to initiate their own safe, sanitation-related enterprises.
Since June 2024, NAMASTE has expanded its scope to include another critical but previously neglected group: waste pickers. They were added as beneficiaries with the scheme setting a target to profile 2,50,000 waste pickers nationwide through the new Waste Picker Enumeration App. As of the latest data, 37,980 waste pickers have been validated in various ULBs. These waste pickers now receive access to protective gear, health benefits, identification, and livelihood support; in short, the scheme is stretching its safety net wider.
Mechanisation, formalization, and convergence are pillars ensuring NAMASTE’s lasting impact. The scheme mandates that no cleaning of sewers or septic tanks be done informally; all such work must be carried out by certified sanitation response units (ERUs) using safety protocols and equipment. It also converges existing schemes, like SRMS (Self-Employment Scheme for Rehabilitation of Manual Scavengers), Swachh Bharat Mission, DAY-NULM, and others, to pool resources, streamline implementation, and eliminate the gap between policy and reality at the local level.
The relevance of NAMASTE is clear: sewer and septic tank work has historically been among the most dangerous jobs in Indian cities, hazardous, stigmatized, underpaid, and largely unprotected. By redefining the sanitation ecosystem, with PPE, health insurance, identity verification, safer protocols, and income support, the scheme is not simply mitigating risk but restoring human dignity. Its target of zero fatalities, zero unsafe exposure, and transforming workers into entrepreneurs reflects a systemic shift in how society values the work that sanitation workers perform.
NAMASTE’s challenges will include accelerating its registration and validation processes, ensuring all ULBs effectively distribute PPE and safety kits, expanding the capacity of ERSs, maintaining consistent oversight via MIS and app-based tools, and ensuring that the planned targets for waste picker enumeration are met.