New Delhi has gotten a makeover ahead of this week’s summit of the Group of 20 nations. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government hopes the effort, with a $120 million price tag, will help showcase the world’s most populous nation’s cultural prowess and strengthen its position on the global stage.
This is a very hard topic to take a side on.
The razing of these shantytowns has been happening for quite a few years now and has mostly become a part of daily life. In preparation for G20 they have only speed up this in some places.
The reason for razing these places has been simply because of them being built on Unauthorised land and people encroaching on government land.It is also true that the people were being provided basic necessities like electricity and water even when living illegally, with bills in their names address to the unauthorised building.(It is important to note electricity and water bills are controlled by the gov in Delhi)
The Government is correct in their try to reclaim stolen land from illegal occupiers. But it is also true that the residents were promised permanent legal housing right where their houses stood.
The residents were wrong to occupy government land illegally, but it is also morally wrong to remove thousands of people suddenly.
Govt land is public land. These people are the homeless public. They have no place to live, so they live in slums. Should they just die?
Most of the posh housing societies in Dwarka are also on encroached land. But even their paintwork doesn’t get scratched. here homes and livelihoods of the have-nots are destroyed.
Uhm, what? Dwarka’s societies don’t really have a land encroachment issue. Most of them were built by DDA and other cooperative housing societies. There are other posh areas where land encroachment is an issue but Dwarka’s societies aren’t one of them.
Government land doesn’t mean, you can just show up and build your house there .For example there has been land which was under ASI, which is land under various monuments. There are many monuments whose land is encroached by both the poor and rich. Both are wrong, be they rich/poor, when removing such encroachment it has been fair for the most part (The only really bad cases which come to my mind are, high level government officials just having big mansions built there). This is the case for forest land as well as land coming under various departments of the government.
Many a times the land has been left there for a reason, for future development, parks, forest land, etc. Land encroachment causes a lot of issues. Also being homeless doesn’t mean they can just build a house wherever they please. You would not be okay if someone one day just shows up and builds a house on the road right in front of your house.
It is known to the people who are building their homes and livelihoods that what they are doing is illegal and there way of life can be destroyed any day, because what they are doing is illegal. The Government for a really long time had been understanding of their situation and just let them be, providing them with basic services on the encroached land. This doesn’t mean that they are right, it just means that they have their house another day.
Also, it isn’t technically correct to call these people homeless, most of them are migrant workers that came here to find better work opportunities. they found work and decided it was better to stay on unauthorized land nearby than to find legal housing which may be further away from their work. Rent in these shanties is pretty similar to legally available housing.
and so the voice of the privileged drones on, equating the rich with the poor.