Why is Django taking offence at being labelled a slop-can carrier? Does he not know that he has eminent company and that there is honor in carrying out slop cans? When Mahatma Gandhi opened his ashram and communal farm in South Africa, he stressed the importance of personal hygiene and a clean environment. He defied caste strictures and insisted that everyone must individually dispose of the waste in their chamber pots and slop cans.
- Gandhiji said, “So long as you do not take the broom and the bucket in your hands, you cannot make your towns and cities clean."
- To the students his advice was, "If you become your own scavengers, you will make your surroundings clean. It needs no less courage to become an expert scavenger than to win a Victoria Cross."
The villagers near his ashram refused to cover excreta with earth. They said: "Surely this is bhangi's work. It is sinful to look at faces, more so to throw earth on them". Gandhi personally supervised the scavenging work in villages. To set an example, he for some months, himself used to go to the villages with a bucket and a broom. Friends and guests went with him. They brought bucketfuls of dirt and stool and buried them in pits.
Photo shows Mahatma Gandhi and his slop-can near a pit:
