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| Thursday, 12 February 2004 |
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Asia's largest slum to get $1.3 bln facelift BOMBAY, (Reuters) Asia's largest slum lies smack bang between a high-tech business district with gleaming glass skyscrapers and a tony Bombay suburb dotted with grand Art Deco mansions. The 600,000 residents of Dharavi are crammed into rows and rows of make-shift shanties, cobbled together with nothing more than asbestos sheets, bamboo sticks, discarded canvas bags, wooden planks, old car tyres and plastic sheets. For many, this ramshackle district in a city of 12 million is merely a reminder that, despite impressive economic growth in recent years, India remains a very poor country. But for its residents, stuck in the middle of India's high-rent financial capital, Dharavi is more than that. It is an affordable place to live, and to work. With general elections only a few months away, India's ruling coalition, led by Hindu nationalists, has announced plans for a billion-dollar redevelopment project in Dharavi. The federal government hopes to capitalise on an economic boom, strong gains in recent state elections and prospects of peace with Pakistan to return it to a second term in power. Poll dates have not been set yet, but the independent election commission is expected to announce them soon, possibly for the months of April and May. For Dharavi the plan means its sea of shanties will be replaced by swank residential buildings, while the polluting, cottage industry factories will be moved to a modern industrial zone. That might sound like progress, but the reality is more complicated. "In popular imagination, Dharavi is a dirty, pest-ridden locality without basic services where thousands of people live in sub-human conditions. It is partly this, but it is much more," journalist Kalpana Sharma wrote in "Rediscovering Dharavi", a recent book. "Dharavi...is a bustling collection of contiguous settlements, each with its own distinct identity." Its fly-infested lanes and garbage dumps have not only provided a backdrop for books and movies, but it has also become a tourist curiosity on the map of visitors, including Prince Charles, who want to see a slice of the "real India". Sea of shanties After years on the political and social sidelines, the sprawling slum in India's "City of Dreams" is about to get a 60-billion-rupee ($1.3 billion) facelift that will transform it into a modern housing and business district, all rolled into one. It is an ambitious plan for what was originally a small fishing village by a creek, which has grown over the years into a magnet of opportunity for people of all religions migrating to Bombay from every corner of India. The federal government will pump in five billion rupees for roads, drainage, electricity, water, schools and training institutes for potters and tanners. "This plan basically uses land as a resource by giving free multi-storeyed housing to slum-dwellers on part of the land, while developing the rest on a commercial basis," Mukesh Mehta, a builder in charge of the project, told Reuters. "It will have high-tech buildings for business as well as schools, hospitals and recreational spaces." But changing Dharavi won't be easy. Spread across 175 hectares (432 acres) in the heart of Bombay, it is home to a motley mix of leather-workers, embroiderers and pickle-makers. This is not the first time the shanty town has been subjected to a facelift. In 1985, former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi decide to upgrade part of the slum, transforming parts of it into neat blocks of apartments with lighting, paved streets and water. But instead of living there themselves, many shanty residents saw the flats as a source of easy cash, and sold them to clerks and other workers at the lower end of the housing market. Magnet of opportunity It is a chaotic warren of factories and homes where tanners beat large strips of leather and potters work at their wheels in dimly-lit rooms, while people cook, eat, sleep and bathe on adjoining pavements. Out of the squalor have emerged success stories, including a poor migrant who launched his own brand of peanut butter, providing further encouragement for the thousands who pour into Bombay every day hoping to make a living, if not a fortune. "Development is fine. But we also need land for the kiln, to store clay and to make pots," said Raju Wala, whose family has been fashioning pots out of clay in Dharavi for generations. Dharavi inhabitants, seen as encroachers who rarely pay for electricity and water, fear redevelopment will saddle them with huge bills and leave them without a roof over their heads. "How will the new project help me? Property taxes will be high and as it is I have so many bills to pay for," rued Bhimavati Maitre, who makes ends meet by washing dishes. Mohammad Kuddus Sheikh, who runs an embroidery unit in a cramped little room where half a dozen people sit hunched over their frames surrounded by swathes of fabric, insists his business would suffer if he was forced to move. He echoed the views of others sitting by vast sheets of dried red chillies, spread out near open drains swarming with flies. "Settlement is a complex issue; it is not just an architectural or engineering job," said Sheela Patel, director of the Society for the Promotion of Area Resource Centers, a group that helps people with housing. "The state must understand the need to bring in investments and fulfill people's dreams." The government believes it is up to the challenge. "It is a big and a complicated exercise. But we are confident we can give a total facelift to Dharavi," said Suresh Joshi, a senior official in the Maharashtra state housing department. "It will become a model township in the country." ($1=45.30 rupees) |
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