Housing - Question of Cities

Big bold ideas that can change public or affordable housing in our cities

India’s urban housing crisis is well-known. Millions live in slums and jhuggis. The housing paradox in Mumbai and Delhi, now increasingly seen in other cities too, means there is a high shortage of affordable homes and a glut of high-priced…

Ignoring the right to shelter keeps Dhaka’s poor cornered

Severely affected by climate change in their homes, between a thousand and 2,000 people migrate to Dhaka every day in search of…

Vulnerabilities of informal settlers continue to exacerbate amid policy conundrum

Kathmandu’s squatter settlements have grown four-fold from 1985 to 2022, and they continue to expand. Mostly migrants, the squatters lack legal tenure…

How the lack of rights worsens climate events for Delhi’s informal workers

As climate-related weather events scorch, flood and chill New Delhi, its informal workers, an estimated 80 percent of its workforce, are left…

Dharavi makeover: Public loss, private gain in this mother of all redevelopment projects

Among the largest informal settlements in the world, Dharavi in Mumbai, is finally set to undergo redevelopment. Aptly called an informal city…

25 years on, Mumbai’s SRA model eludes housing crisis but yields hefty profits for builders

When slum dwellers are rehabilitated, they face a new set of problems and challenges. They are pushed into cramped tenements in multi-storeyed…

Mumbai needs a master plan for slum land, not mere populism

Slum land was seen as a huge profitable space in which slum dwellers could be pushed into small areas while the larger…

Insider accounts of precarious lives in a slum and a resettlement colony

What does it mean to live in a slum not only devoid of basic amenities – where even auto rickshaws refuse to ply – but also under the constant threat of demolition? What does it take to rebuild a life…

Mumbai: The way forward from slums to affordable housing

That Mumbai’s slums are a perpetual feature of the city and there is not enough land for affordable housing are manufactured myths.…

Housing as a way to claim citizenship and exercise rights in Indian cities

The city is a key site where various notions of citizenship are claimed and contested. Since much of urban India lives and…