..Though
‘slums are the places where dwellings are unfit for human habitation’ the
Government of India
Recently,
The Hindu had a report on India
Naturally,
it said the slum population in India
Focus of
the story was the slum population had a better child sex ratio of 922 girls for
every 1000 boys than the urban India India
Signs of
progress! Okay, maybe, when we see the figures as pure population statistics.
But this
huge growth in slum population over the decade, almost 25 per cent, belies it and
cautions us to see the figures more as the signs of unplanned rapid
urbanization.
‘Slums are
residential areas where dwellings are unfit for human habitation’, the report
says quoting the Census of India. Now the direct corollary to this definition is
the slums must not exist in a civilized world of the socialist, secular and
democratic Republic that India
There must
be efforts on war scale to undo the concept of slums! Daydreaming, isn’t it?
Okay, it
cannot happen in one go and for a country like India
Sincere
efforts, floating promises and a multiplying slum population with every count!
The
government that says ‘slums are unfit for human habitation’ readily categorises
slums as ‘notified’, ‘recognised’ and ‘identified’ the report says quoting the
Census of India categorisation.
‘Notified’
and ‘recognised’ slums, that are unfit for human habitation according to the
Census of India definition, are accorded legal status, and ‘enjoy’ some civic
amenities.
‘Identified’
slums, ‘unfit as well for human habitation’ are ‘kept’ devoid of any legal
sanctity though they too are recognised ‘officially’ in some form as the
precondition to be categorised as an ‘identified’ slum is it has to have ‘at
least 60-70 tenements with at least 300 people’ as the report says. These
‘identified slums’ are not extended ‘legal protection and municipal services’.
The catch
is, according to The Hindu report based on the Census of India 2011, the
largest chunk of slum population dwells in the dwellings of the ‘identified’
slums that are lowest in the ‘hierarchy’ of slums in India (where every slum is
defined as ‘unfit for human habitation’).
Now, this
‘largest chunk’, one million of which are in Delhi, India’s national capital, claimed
to be world-class city, cannot even ask the Government of India to provide them
with that elusive sewage-line or water pipeline or electricity connections.
Human
misery notified, recognised, identified the Government of India way – strangely
familiar – predictably strange – in the socialist, secular and democratic
Republic India that is busy discussing ‘requirement of toilets and temples in
India’ these days!
©/IPR: Santosh Chaubey - http://severallyalone.blogspot.com/
