Gurugram's luxury towers stink as Bengali-speaking sanitation workers 'vanish overnight'

Gurugram has been recently facing an unexpected and distressing crisis, as piles of garbage have taken over the streets, spilling across neighbourhoods once known for their cleanliness and order, Hindustan Times reported.

According to the report, hundreds of migrant workers, particularly Bengali-speaking domestic workers and sanitation staff, have fled Gurugram. Their sudden disappearance has left housing societies and city officials scrambling. These workers, many of whom have lived in the city for years, have left behind their jobs and homes out of fear, following a police drive that allegedly involved random checks, detentions, and deportation threats.

From Palam Vihar and Sector 57 to Golf Course Extension Road and newer parts of the city, uncollected garbage bags line the roads, and waste collection has come to a halt in many places. With no formal workforce left to manage it, residents are now hiring tractor trolleys to carry waste to dumping spots. But without trained staff or proper segregation, this has only led to more unplanned and hazardous dumping.

“They didn’t even inform us. Many just vanished overnight out of fear,” HT quoted Richa Vohra, a waste volunteer in Sector 57, as saying.
Between July 13 and 21, nearly 100 people, most of them working as house helps or garbage collectors, were allegedly detained. Some were released and allegedly asked to board trains to Assam. Families of those detained say that many didn’t even get a chance to collect their Aadhaar cards or speak to anyone. “The police just picked them up. My brother-in-law was one of them,” said a relative of Anwar Hussain, a garbage collector.