[Sarai Newsletter] Yamuna Pushta: A Conversation

[The Sarai Programme]

A Conversation on the Yamuna Pushta

July 30, 2:00 pm onwards
Sarai Interface Zone, 
29 Rajpur Road, New Delhi-54.

In the last ten years, the landscape of Delhi has morphed out of recognition. 
From mixed neighborhoods to exclusive elite conclaves; hundreds of informal 
markets to a score of glitzy shopping malls; from ‘brick and mortar’ 
industries to high tech information highways, the change has been rapid and 
palpable. With the addition of Gurgaon and Noida, the city has lost its 
center - in accept the broad political consensus crafted through the last 
decade's gentrification process. This pact has on the one has brought a 
determinate new ‘vision’ to city planning - seeking to build capital assets 
and infrastructures, and 'improve' the ‘environment’ of the city.  On the 
other, it has depopulated the city of low-income communities. 

Since the year 2000, over one lakh jhuggies have been demolished. While some 
basti residents have got tiny pieces of land in the inhospitable, un-serviced 
wildernesses on the periphery of the city, a huge mass of people have simply 
been rendered homeless. Resettlement colonies like Bawana and Holambi Kalan 
do not have even minimum basic urban services or security of tenure. 
Precedents for service provision to the poor are being progressively diluted.

Given this scenario, is it possible to imagine an idea of equity in the new 
city? What is it? How can it be forged? The lesson of the recently demolished 
Yamuna Pushta is that there are very few existing means of democratic 
representation for the urban poor. Indeed, the eviction took place under 
sheer psychological, and sometimes physical, violence. Channels for organized 
opposition also seem to be in a state of bewilderment. The new UPA coalition, 
is of course, sending out mixed signals. The CMP says that “forced evictions 
and demolition of slums will be stopped”. But given the all pervasiveness of 
the existing paradigm of “urban renewal” can we really expect a fundamental 
shift in policy? And of course, more importantly, what political economy is 
policy really based on? 

This brings us to the most important question of them all - what is the role 
of non-state actors at this juncture in Delhi? Are we going to only focus on 
the de jure change of policies? Is that enough to shake the balance of forces 
in a way significant enough to effect a de facto change in situation? Do we 
need to go beyond the realm of ‘civil society’ in order to understand and 
intervene in the not-so-civil‘ political society’? Do we need a new language, 
a new discourse to articulate opposition and alternatives? How do we link 
this task of crafting a new language or new frameworks with our day to day 
tasks, energies, pursuits, concerns, skills and, of course, our interests? 
We hope you will join us for an open house discussion on these and other 
issues. 

Diya Mehra and Lalit Batra  


-- 
The Sarai Programme
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies
29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054
Tel:  (+91) 11 23960040
       (+91) 11 23942199, ext 307
Fax: (+91) 11 23943450
www.sarai.net