A difficult one to slum up, why, because every preconceived notion we had about slums was challenged, and buried.
Here are a few facts:
The definition of a slum (in India) is property built on Government land. The buildings themselves have ownership, but the land part of the property is entirely owned by the Government.
Dharavi Slum is approximately 1.75 square kilometers (~0.7sq miles)
There are approximately 1 million people living and working in this space leading it to be the most densely human populated place on the planet.
The "declared" economic output of the slum is a staggering $1B US
Shocked, astounded, we certainly were. Those statistics don't mean to say that the slums are full of weathly individuals. Quite the opposite. There can be no doubt in anyone's mind that the vast majority of people living in a slum are ultimately very poor, but not as poor as to have nothing. The simple fact is, you're there, you've a roof over your head. The people who literally have nothing are the families and individuals living by the side of the road, beneath underpasses, where ever they can. Many slum dwellers still cannot afford the rent for a slum dwelling, but they do have a job and they do have an income. Where they sleep is next to their job, and more often than not, at their job, in the same building.
Within Dharavi Slum there are ATM's, grocery stores, cinemas, cafe's, places to eat. It is a city within a city, a living within the living, a commercial success in evey sense of commercialisation, but a standard of living below any that you might want to imagine yourself in.
The value placed on the land the slum occupies is virtually unimaginable with many of the properties being owned not by the slum dwellers, but by landlords holding out for the unimaginable wealth that can be generated by selling to a construction and development company. That price is escalating every day. A few years ago millions of Rupees were changing hands, now it is in the billions. And that's just for a piece of land a few metres by a few metres. Here's the rub. A slum dweller lives there, should the property developer wish to buy, they pay the owner of the slum building and then they promise to rehouse the dweller, usually in the building that is to be put in it's place. The remainder of the building can then be either sold off, or rented out for profit. It's not a bed of roses though and this observer can't but help feel that corruption, manipulation and exploitation are the cornerstone of the profit. From what we'd seen the buildings put in the place of the original slum space were not advantageous to the dwellers, basically representing a vertical slum space rather than a horizontal one.
Where before there was cooperation between individuals, now there was a concrete wall and a padlock, where little crime existed, now crime is rife. It is not well thought out and the only advantages to come from this earlier indiscretion of power, is that slum dwellers have learned the lesson, preferring not to sell at all and choosing to remain exactly where they are. Interesting huh, read on.
So, who lives in a slum. Well here's a statistic for you, we were told 40% of the police force of Mumbai live in a slum, most likely because they are underpaid, but also because fundamentally the slum provides for a different dynamic of living. India is a rural country despite huge populations of people living in the cities there is a migratory path that entails a rural dweller moving to the city for 10-11 months of the year, then moving back to the country with the "wealth" they have accumulated to be with family, wives, offspring and siblings, returning back to the slum once their measured time has passed. If you want to live as inexpensively as possible, you live in a place with the lowest rates of rent. These places are the slums. Of course, that's about where the bed of roses ends. The astoundingly high population density and the fact that a slum is not planned nor has any infrastructure means that 15,000 people can share a toilet. At least the seat is never cold, not that they use seats....squatting is the way and apparently is a better way to realise a bowel movement anyway, so hey, not every innovation is an improvement, unless of course you like to read a newspaper.
So, what does one do in a slum. Well, pretty much any number of things. From making food (the vast majority of popadums eaten in Mumbai are made in the slums with the manufacturer being given the materials and then paid 20 Rupees per kilo of dried popadums. Popadums don't weigh very much), to smelting aluminium, to recycling plastics that are collected from all over Mumbai to making the delicate pastries that are sold and eaten at roadside stalls or leather manufacturing and textiles including jeans, bags, shirts. One statistic that was more worrisome was the prevalence of higher end goods coming out of the slum. At the time of writing I don't know whether they are just fakes, knock offs of well known brands, or whether that label that reads "made in India" really ought to read "made for virtually nothing by someone who depends on making many to make a pitance living in an Indian slum". We saw Gucci, Lacoste, Lee Cooper amongst many other name brands. All being manufactured under the same auspices as the popadums.
What else can I say about Dharavi. The streets are irresponsibly narrow and low (poor people are rarely 6'4" and 220Ibs), the drainage for the sewerage runs along the same paths as you walk, just dug a little lower, if you don't own a property you can't use the shared facilities (the ones that are shared among 15,000 others) so you crap in the streets or on the dumps....yes, the dumps that don't even contain anything that is recyclable or has any further use. The average residence is only about 2.5x3.5m in area and will house the entire family. Electricity is available, mainly for the in house fan and in some cases the satellite TV (I know right, but if there is one thing that can stop an Indian from thinking about moolah, it's a soap opera!), roads are few and far between, crime is virtually zero (what do poor people have to steal and with 1 million in 1.75 square kilometers, how are you intending to keep the theft to yourself?) but that's not to say the place is not riddled with people who will try to rip you off). There is education, but it is basic and funded by NGO's. The government appears to have a fairly strong stance on educating the poor. They don't, they wont. We asked at an NGO why that was the case, surely a country that can send €2B to Europe to help out with the debt crisis can establish an education program in a slum. The answer was horrifying, but then it dawned on us, is it any different in America. If you don't keep the poor people dumb, how do you expect to keep political office and get rich doing it.
In India, the government does not educate people in slums because;
1. They are earning a whole load or wollah without needing to spend a penny, taxes are collected on that $1B of declared income but it's not spent on slum infrastructure or the people generating it.
2. There are 1 million people living in a small space, like one big family. That's probably 0.8m votes if you consider young children stay with their mothers in the rural villages and there are a bunch of kiddies not old enough to mark a ballot. The way the slums vote is the difference between winning and losing an election in Mumbai and slummed together - in India. Finally,
3. Low labour costs leads to higher margin which ties in very nicely with the first rule of Mumbai, money rules.
Recycling of metal containers that contain cooking oils. Wallahs roam the city looking for these tins, collecting them from the thousands of food stalls and restaurants. They then take them here where they are rinsed, cleaned, graphics removed, repaired and sold back to the manufacturer.
The same goes for paint tins. Paint removed, graphics off, cleaned in and out, repurposed by selling back to the original maufacturer of the contents.
Giant turban!
Here is the plastic recycling line, sorting the different types of polymer out according to hardness.
After the recycling the plastic is ground up into shards which is then melted into pellets (if thermoplastic). washed and dried on the roof tops of the slum buildings.
What is fascinating about the entirity of the Dharavi Slum is the way it fits together. None of the facilities associated with modern living but every aspect of modern humanity. The slum provides an enormous service to Mumbai too, the recycling of the plastic that Mumbaikars leave strewn everywhere, the collection and recycling of metals, the processing of goat skins to leather products after the mutton has ben served in the restaurants, the dying of fabrics and the production of food to compliment the feeding of over 16 million people. To this observer, Mumbai would not work without the slums that support it, and the slums would not exist in the way they do without Mumbai. All being said, I do hope the Government starts to consider that it does not have to exist insuch a fashion. Look towards Korea and Singapore for higher quality housing, improved facilities and an improvement to everyone's quality of life. That in consideration, Indians must also do their part and start to look after the material items and dwellings that that they have.
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