In the post independence period, India has sought rapid economic growth through 'planned development'. This has entailed large scale investments in dams, roads, mines, power plants, industrial estates, new cities and other projects involving land acquisition. A large number of people have been displaced to make way for these development projects.
Amongst such victims are the slum dwellers in Delhi. Slum demolitions and the new land use on the evacuated sites have been contributing to the restructuring of the urban space in the capital. Globalization and the aspiration of the capital city to become a "global metropolis and a world class city' (DDA, 2007) had a decisive impact on the direction followed to transform the land use and reshape the urban landscape. With economic liberalization in 1991, one saw a shift from centrally planned land management to a neoliberal mantra entailing public-private partnership. In the case of Delhi, this meant that the government sold land acquired for 'public purposes' to private developers. With huge profits to be made from commercial development, the real estate market is booming. The lands occupied by squatters command a premium.
These are the new enclosures: what were once unclaimed spaces, vacant plots of land along railway tracks and by the Yamuna river in Delhi that were settled and made habitable by squatters, are now ripe for redevelopment. Luminal lands that the urban poor could live on have now been incorporated into the profit market. The real estate boom is taking priority over the housing needs of ordinary citizens.
It was in 1990 that the government of Delhi adopted a 'new' Delhi slum policy reiterated in the Master Plan for Delhi, 2021. The main objectives of the Master Plan of Delhi, 2021 were, an improved infrastructure base, maintaining the tempo of economic growth and to make the national capital a global city. The objective of making Delhi a global city would necessitate and require more and more land to be made available for modern commercial and industrial ventures, within the city as well as its periphery. One consequence of this is that Delhi would have to grow through exclusion of poor migrants as well as the existing poor in the city.
Despite changes in the policy regimes and parties in power, policy makers in the National Capital have never accepted the rights of squatters and slum dwellers to reside on the plots which they are occupying. In some cases, land titles on a leasehold basis were given to evicted households in resettlement sites during the 1960s and 1970s. Unfortunately, concern for the environment in Delhi, both at the state and the NGO level, manifested itself in a peculiar way. It has strengthened the lobby against provision of in situ tenure for the slum dwellers, and not allowing industries in select residential areas within the city.
Planners, policy makers, civil society activists are apprehensive of the city being flooded with migrants, its limited amenities being choked with population invasion and the city environment degenerating due to mushrooming of slums. The latter are now seen as a threat to the macro environment in the city, their illegality in occupying public land being compounded by their tapping of amenities like water, electricity, etc without paying user charges.
Resettlement and Rehabilitation policies have hardly been implemented to take care of the displaced. Though many project authorities and funding agencies speak of R and R in one breath, they are two distinct realities. While resettlement is the physical implantation in a new colony, rehabilitation is total re-establishment of lost livelihood. Resettlement is thus primarily an economic initiative. Rehabilitation on the other hand, involves replacing the lost economic assets, rebuilding the community system that has been weakened by displacement and attending to the psychological trauma of being displaced and of losing their livelihood.
A modest proportion of the population in Delhi lives in slums and squatters. They account for about 15.72 percent of the population in the national capital region. Though several civil society groups have challenged these figures for them the so called illegal encroachers of public lands are not accounted for. In Delhi, the category of the urban poor mainly comprises of the inhabitants in JJ clusters / squatter settlements. These inhabitants are service providers, which includes domestic help, hawkers and vendors, low paid workers in the industrial, commercial and trade / business sectors etc. The socio-economic constraints on access to income pose constraints to food and other basic necessities including shelter. As a result, they are constrained to live in the worst kind of settlements. Substandard housing is not only the consequence of poverty but also policy and financial constraints imposed on the government departments and agencies to provide adequate services for the poor. However, the type of housing they are constrained to choose is largely the consequence of poverty, and denial of a piece of land for shelter at an affordable price.
Migrants from other parts of the country mainly comprise the population of a slum. These people usually migrate in the hope of better job opportunities. Out of these migrants 83.9 percent are from rural areas. As a result of increasing globalization and liberalization the attraction towards Delhi as a source of better employment will only increase. As Delhi continues to grow further in the context of a globalizing and liberalizing economy, its attraction as a source of employment for rural migrants is likely to be further enhanced. This in turn is likely to lead to a further increase in the population living in slums. Urban policy needs to find ways of integrating slums into the city's settlement system and ensuring that these settlements have access to basic services.
The poor typically inhabit unplanned or semi-planned developments. In Delhi these are classified as (a) Notified Slums in Old Walled City area; (b)Resettlement Colonies; (c) Relocated JJ Clusters and (d) JJ Clusters or Squatter settlements. The squatter settlements are treated as encroachments on mainly public lands. As such these are illegal clusters (JJCs) and are devoid of any legal entitlements. However, efforts have been made by the government to extend basic social and environmental services to them. JJ clusters are scattered all over the city. Generally they are situated on the vacant land along railway lines, roads, drains and river embankments and also vacant spaces near residential, industrial and commercial complexes. Around 55 per cent of squatters are near the residential areas and 40% along the road. The squatter settlements or JJCs assume strategic importance as far as the issues of unorganized settlements are concerned. In 1951, Delhi had 12749 JJs scattered over 199 clusters. By 1973 the number of JJs had reached 98483 spread over 1373 clusters.
Resettlement Schemes
The resettlement scheme pursued in 1962-77, with a concentrated effort in 1975-77 resulted in the resettlement of 2.4 lakh JJs in different parts of Delhi. In 1977 only 20000 JJ households remained to be relocated. But, in 1983 the number of squatter households had gone upto 1.13 lakhs.
In 2001 the JJ clusters had declined to 729 from 1080 in 1994 due to relocation of around 300 clusters. Water and sanitation facilities in these unorganized colonies, particularly JJ clusters, are poor. Only 21 % of colonies are covered with piped water supply and 10% are covered by sanitation. Most of the facilities available or offered are non- functional in around 75-80% of the settlements. Around 85-90% of JJ clusters did not have even community toilets, forcing habitants to defecate in the open near the water bodies or drainage channels.
Resettlement colonies, as the name suggests, comprise of JJ cluster households that have been resettled from their original settlements. The total population in resettlement colonies is estimated to be 18 lakhs (2000) in 44 resettlement colonies. The first resettlement programme was carried out in 1961 and subsequently many JJ clusters have been shifted to resettlement colonies. However, given the limited size of slum population prior to 1970, it was possible to shift most of the households (43, 000) living in these settlements to various resettlement colonies, but after 1970, as the rate of migration increased, resettlement has not been able to keep pace with the growth of JJ clusters.
The results of a NCAER (2002) Survey suggest that the resettlement colonies in contrast to slums have better access to essential amenities. The legal recognition given to resettlement colonies makes it mandatory for the government to ensure the provision of basic infrastructure in these settlements5. JJ clusters, on the other hand, do not enjoy any such entitlements since they are considered illegal occupants of public/ private land. The difference in entitlements is what accounts for the difference in access to basic infrastructure between the JJ clusters and resettlement colonies and this difference in turn contributes to the overall better living conditions in resettlement colonies as against slums.
Nevertheless, while JJ clusters are worse off than resettlement colonies, both are far from having an adequate provision of basic amenities. Indeed, the evidence from the NCAER (2002) study should not be taken to mean that all is well with the resettlement colonies. The provision of infrastructure in resettlement colonies is more often than not adequate, given its population size.
Over the years there has been a gradual dilution of provisions of resettlement for the slum population. To begin with, the plot size allocated to households in resettlement colonies has been steadily declining. The provision in the Master Plan of Delhi (1962) was of an allotment of 80 sq. metres per household. This was subsequently reduced to 40 sq. metres during the massive resettlements of the 1970s. The Master Plan of Delhi (2001) then brought this down to 25 sq. metres. In reality the plot size actually allocated is even smaller. Slums that were resettled in Narela (2000) as well as evictees from the Yamuna Pushta slums (2004) were allocated a plot size of 12.5 sq. metres. Apart from limited space per family, housing on small plot size contributes to the deterioration of resettlement colonies into slums. It is argued that current slum resettlement projects usually end up looking not very different from the slums they replace. This is more 'recycling' of poverty than resettlement with protected livelihoods of the resettled.
Also, the first resettlement of JJ clusters in early 1960s entitled the residents not only to a plot size of 80 sq. metres but one that was serviced with WC, water tap and plinth. Selection of the resettlement site had to be done keeping in mind availability of essential services such as water supply, sewerage and electricity as well as schools, dispensary and community centres. Residents were given ownership rights- subsidy was to the tune of 50% and repayment was on a monthly basis.
Over time these standards have got diluted; there has been a shift towards provision of services for a group rather than on an individual basis. Thus, in the resettlement schemes carried out in 1975-76, along with a decline in plot size to 25 sq. meters and elimination of ownership rights, the following standards were laid down for the provision of services:
_ Hand pump (1) for 20 persons
_ Filtered water hydrants (1) for 40 persons
_ Bathrooms (1 seat) for 6 families
_ Latrines (1 seat) for 5 families
In recent years, resettlement sites are increasingly on the outskirts of the city (for example, Narela, Holambi Kalan, Bawana, Madanpur Khader, Tikri Khurd) in violation of the recommendations of the Master Plan, which argued for integration of people from different cross-section of income groups in residential neighbourhoods. Apart from lack of infrastructure facilities in these colonies, what is of particular concern to the poor is the lack of transport facilities. These sites located on the periphery of the cities provide little employment opportunities for the poor for which they have to commute to the city centre. However, the absence of proper transport facilities makes this journey costly in terms of physical and monetary resources as well as in terms of the time spent on travel. As a result, people often find it prudent to sell off their tenements and return to the city, thus defying the logic of resettlement.
There are also problems with the resettlement process. During the resettlement drive of 1975- 76, provisions were made for camping sites to allow temporary habitations. Such considerations no longer form part of the resettlement process.
The decision to relocate slums in Yamuna Pushta was taken at a high level meeting in January 2004, the first demolitions were carried out in February and the process was completed by early April. Not only were the residents not given enough time to prepare for the demolition, the authorities did not also bother that the demolition drive in the months of February and March coincided with school exams. The bulldozers advanced at midday when most people were at work. Further, many residents of JJ clusters were left out of the resettlement process. The list of households eligible for plots in the resettlement site was based on a four- year old survey which did not take into account the new residents in the slum. Also, houses recorded as 'locked' in the survey were not considered for resettlement.
The approach of the government towards areas notified as Slums under the Slum areas Act 1961 has been three pronged (i) Clearance/Relocation; (ii) Insitu upgradation; and (iii) Environmental Improvement Schemes. Clearance / relocation has been the mainstay of the policy towards the squatters and JJ clusters. The program of squatter clearance was discontinued at the end of the sixth plan (1980-85). The clearance program has been initiated again in 2005. The general policy adopted by the government has been two fold (i) No new encroachment shall be permitted on public land and (ii) Past encroachments viz. those in existence up to 1990 would not be removed without providing alternatives. A three pronged strategy has been adopted by Government of Delhi for dealing with the problems of JJ Clusters. These strategies are (i) Relocation of Jhuggie Households; (ii) In-situ Up gradation of JJ Clusters; and (iii) Extension of minimum basic civic amenities for community use under EIUS schemes in JJclusters.
Issues emerging from Resettlement Schemes
There are several issues that come up regarding shelter for the urban poor. The evaluation of slums, JJ clusters and resettlement sites, housing workers and service providers in Delhi highlighted the following ones:
(i) Legal Security of Tenure: Studies conducted by various NGOs and CBOs highlighted the problem of security of legal tenure, rights of the dwellers on resettlement sites and the JJ clusters. Without adequate documented tenure, the residents cannot obtain loans from financial institutions. Additionally, unscrupulous property dealers offer loans to residents and then coerce them to leave under duress.
(ii) Access to Appropriate Mechanisms of Finance: The poor are unable to meet the requirements of conventional financing institutions, and housing micro-finance is poorly developed.
(iii) In-situ Up gradation of Existing JJ clusters: Around 80% of dwellers of JJ clusters favour in-situ up-gradation of clusters with provision of plots not less than 40m2. In case the relocation is unavoidable, it shall be within 2km radius. If plots cannot be provided, relocation in G+1 structures is preferred.
(iv) Access to Public Goods and Services: In all the relocation sites, and 85-90% of JJ clusters, residents did not have access to public goods and services. These areas lack general health services, access to portable water and sanitation.
(v) Varying plots sizes at relocation sites: The eligibility criteria for resettlement is restricted to those who are (i) Indian Nationals and (ii) residing on the respective site as on 31st December 1998 as evidenced by ration cards. Because of the cut-off date, up to 40-45% families of JJ clusters are ineligible for relocation. Hence, it has become very difficult to get encroached land pockets completely vacated. The existing practice adopted by slum department for provision of plot to the beneficiaries is (i) 18m2 to beneficiaries settled before 1990 and 12.5m2 to beneficiaries settled during 1990-98. This practice of providing differential plots sizes to the beneficiaries, which is lower than the UNHCR guideline of 40 m2, is one of the major issues to be tackled as part of the slum relocation policy.
(vi) Land Suitability of Relocation Sites: The land provided for the construction of homes in five of the twelve sites is uninhabitable. In areas of Hastsal, Bhalsawa and Madanpur Khader, around 15-20 % of plots are 5-10 feet below Ground Level and vulnerable to flooding.
Mega Transformation of Delhi and the Exclusive Approach to the Poor
The processes of urbanization and globalization have played a crucial role in the treatment of the poor in urban centres. With urbanization increasing at the rate that it is, forecasts claim that half of humanity will be living in cities within another two generations. Globalization and urbanization are operating within a capitalist and liberal economic system driven by the desire for profits and economic growth. Cities, viewed as the epicentres of growth and employment, attract in huge numbers, people from the rural areas. With the market forces in play and the accompanying new agricultural policies, households in rural areas find it difficult to survive and shift to urban centres in order to find employment and livelihood options.
Consequently, they also look for shelter. They invariably end up squatting on vacant pieces of land, since the cities are not designed to accommodate the increasing population influx (Roy, 2008).
Urbanization is the result of a combination of factors. With increasing globalization and structural reforms taking place, a parallel phenomenon of increasing investment in industry and infrastructure by both the government and the private sector can be witnessed. This is further accompanied and reinforced by the advancement in and spread of the transport and construction sectors. Economic growth is given an impetus when cities get linked to the larger global economy which allows the flow of capital from outside the country. The benefits of the investment of this capital are usually seen in the urban centres. Developing countries witness a virtuous cycle of liberalization, investment and economic growth that emerges. This cycle accelerates the pace of urbanization (Kundu and Kundu, 2010).
According to a United Nations Population Fund report in 2007, 'no country in the industrial age has ever achieved significant economic growth without urbanization'. A contrary view argues that cities are not only the machines that produce wealth but also those which expand inequalities. This can be seen in the increasing number of the urban poor. The Homeless International and Asian Coalition for Housing Rights (2006) claims that the greatest paradox of urban areas is that it is the poor people, who live in these urban cities and are source of cheap labour, which are responsible for building the city economy. However, they get no guarantees for a safe existence and livelihood in the city, nor any of the benefits resulting from its development.
Developing countries in order to attract international capital and investment from the global markets seek to build and improve the infrastructure in their major cities.
The access to land and capital resources is made easier by the government in order to allow multinational companies as well as companies within the country to set up shop. In order to facilitate this, governments go on 'sanitation drives' to remove 'low valued' activities from the city. In this process slums are removed from the main parts of the city and pushed to the periphery so as to make space for the big companies. What we are witnessing is the operating of a capitalist State based driven by neoliberal policies. According to Shivani Chaudhry, a human rights activist, 'there is a strong visible collusion with the private sector. And this is a trend we're seeing in Bombay, Delhi, Hyderabad, Bangalore, virtually, every major metropolis in our country. It's the Shanghai-zation trend, which is all about trying to create ultra-modern cities like Shanghai'. According to Dunu Roy of the Hazards Centre, Delhi, the state is withdrawing from its constitutional welfare obligations under pressure from global "market" forces, and hence both land and housing are becoming commercial goods rather than legal rights.
According to the Global Report on Human Settlements projects of 'beautification' are often undertaken in the event of upcoming summits, sports events and the like. At such times, schemes of slum clearance are given justification and legitimacy. This has been witnessed in India and in China. In the case of China, 'urbanizing villages' could be seen emerging near and around the larger cities prior to the 2006 olympics. Similarly, in India this could be seen at the time of the Commonwealth Games. Till the people living in slums had some utility in terms of cheap labour and resources, they were allowed in the city. However, after that the sanitation drives would begin. There are no provisions made for their shelter subsequently. Where provisions of plots or alternate housing are made, very few receive the benefits and most are excluded.
'Shelter vulnerability' characterize cities in the developing world along with 'economic vulnerabilty'. The situation in India is an illustration of this shelter vulnerability (Lal, 2002).
Urbanization needs to be understood within the context of globalization. Globalization can be defined as, 'a situation wherein capital seeks to penetrate the boundaries of nations and create a global market enabling its free movement. This process is accompanied by a host of cultural, political and economic mechanisms to facilitate the rule of private capital', (Kumar, 2008). In India, and within Indian metropolises, including Delhi, we see the emergence of a new culture and ethos. Many changes are taking place as a result of global finance.
Cities like Delhi feel the need for congestion free roads, fancy urinals, removal of slums, movie theatres and huge malls well beyond the means of an ordinary person. Delhi and all of its human and non human elements are being incorporated into this framework of globalization. This process of globalization entails changing or altering life spaces as well allowing for the opening up of the market. Beautification of the city requires throwing out the poor to the absolute peripheries, which is upheld and given legitimacy by the judiciary. The new spaces thus created are then, in the name of infrastructural development, seen as paving the way for the market and its effective functioning. Cities are, 'trying to gain economic efficiency through a process of exclusion of marginal areas and marginalized sections of population who cannot afford the costs of living in the fast globalizing urban space', (Kundu and Mahadevia, 2002, p. 1). One can see the displacement of slums, building stadiums and flyovers, the emergence of new modes of transport all of which are taken up with the justification that there will be a 'better' use of land, that is to say, a use which will be more profitable. The city witnesses what can be called elite capture in global cities which leads to measures of sanitization and pushing migrants to the outskirts. This exclusionary globalization and urbanization, based on the interests of the elites, is further reinforced by the government and government policies that favour those elites.
It is the higher income groups that are a minority which are considered to be worthy and legitimate citizens of the city, while the poor are shunned. Dunu Roy points out that this bias towards the elites was not present in the earlier, but is becoming more and more evident in the recent years with differential norms being formulated (in terms of housing area, water, electricity, sanitation, health, education) for different classes.
In order to rightfully have any claim on public spaces in Delhi, having private means is almost a necessary condition. As Amita Baviskar explains, 'full citizenship is only allowed to those on the right side of the property and class divide. The property-less live hand to mouth: denied space, shelter and security'. ( )
Since 2000, the pace of slum demolitions in Delhi had increased starkly. The combined number of slums or JJCs demolished by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) and the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) for the five years leading up to 2000 rose more than tenfold. This increase is the direct outcome of the judiciaries expanded role in demanding slum clearance. Whereas the decision to raze a slum was earlier almost exclusively in the domain of Delhi's various land-owning agencies, particularly the DDA, these wings of the government now have little say in determining the legal and political status of such settlements. Instead the primary avenue by which slums are demolished today begins when a resident's welfare association files a writ petition for the removal of a neighbouring slum, proceeds when the courts approve it and ends when the land owning agency abides by the courts decision.
Therefore, despite the fact that the Delhi slum policy evinced some concern in protecting squatters interests - or at least introduced some conditions to their eviction - the intervention of by the judiciary in the last decade or so has undermined the policy to a large extent.
There have been some judgements which deny the obligation of the state to provide resettlement alternatives to the evicted families. Judges have remarked that the poor have no right to housing: resettling a squatter is like rewarding a pickpocket. By ignoring the absence of low income housing, the judiciary has criminalized the very presence of the poor in the city. Evictions are justified as being in the public interest, as if the public does not include the poor and as if issues of shelter and livelihood are not public concerns. The courts have not only brushed aside representation from basti-dwellers, they have also penalized government officials for not demolishing fast enough.
There is a growing antagonism between the housing needs for the poor and the aspiration for a 'clean and green' Delhi. One can see the precedence of the 'green agenda' over the 'brown agenda' in the capital, since cleaning the city also involves slum clearance and thus 'cleaning up' the city from its slums and slum dwellers. The massive evictions along the banks of the Yamuna river (the Yamuna pushta slum clusters), where the argument of polluting the river was utilized by the Delhi High Court to justify the removal of all slum clusters, exemplify this antagonism.
In spite of its initial state good intention to integrate people with low incomes into the urban fabric, the public policy of urban planning and housing implemented by the DDA failed to meet the demand of the poorest section or the population. As a result, the latter resorted to informal habitat, and had no option but to occupy vacant lands, essentially public land, where they self-constructed makeshift housing - or JJs. According to a study commissioned in 2003 by the DDA to the association of urban management and development authorities in order to assess its track record the following was found. For low income housing the DDA was to develop 27,487 hectares of land in the 20 year period of the first master plan. Of this, only 15,540 was acquired. Similarly, in 1962, the total existing urban residential land was 4694 hectares. The plan proposed to add another 14,479 hectares by 1981. But the land actually developed was only 7316 hectares. Roughly half the projected residential land was not developed. As a result one has observed that there has been a continuous increase of the population in of the JJ cluster s or squatter settlements from the 1950s till the 1990s. in 1998, the population living in squatter settlements was estimated to be around three million people scattered in around 1100 clusters of varied sizes throughout the urban area, and accounted for about 27 per cent of the total urban population - as compared to 5 per cent in 1951 an 18 per cent in 1991 - but occupying only less than 6 per cent of the city land. These figures illustrate the inadequacy of the various slum clearance programmes implemented since the 1950s as well as the inability to provide affordable housing for the poor by the DDA.
With the impending Commonwealth games in 2010, once again slums dwellers are the victims. 24 new flyovers and 200 km of new network on the Delhi Metro are on the horizon. The DDA is building a Commonwealth Games Village in the city which involves several billion dollars of infrastructure up-gradation and new infrastructure. The site for this village was originally the slum settlement called Yamuna Pushta which was later relocated or resettled. The slum was removed because it was believed that the occupants were polluting the river. Environmentalists question how the government thinks that suddenly it is eco friendly to carry out such large scale construction and it was eco-unfriendly when there were slums there. As Jean du Plessis describes it, such kind of mega events and mega projects result in 'a negative housing legacy for the urban poor' (du Plessis 2007).
Statement of the Problem
In 2000, more than 3 million people lived in 1160 jhuggi bastis across town. They accounted for about a quarter of Delhi's population. In the last 5-7 years, about half of them have been demolished and the same fate awaits the rest. A majority of those evicted have not been resettled. Even among the people entitled to resettlement there are many who have gotten nothing. The government claims it has no more land to give and yet demolitions continue.
What is evident is that the effective policies for slums are lacking. Resettlement, which can be defined as the physical relocation of slum dwellers to some other place, more often than not does not happen. Where it does take place, the amenities and facilities they are supposed to provide are missing, thus rendering the conditions of those displaced even worse. Rehabilitation, which is the complete re-building of every person's life and livelihood. On both counts successive governments have failed to deliver. Slums and slum dwellers are now seen as a nuisance and an eyesore something that needs to be removed as it does not fit into the conception of this 'new' city that is being envisioned. People are being evicted and their homes are being demolished mercilessly and no viable alternative has been provided. These people only stand to lose their homes, their work and their livelihoods.
