mumbai slums

“Hello Teacher,  kis ka accha hain? Mera ya uska?” “Mera, Mera” (Hello Teacher. Whose toy is better - hers or mine?” “Mine, Mine”) Two paper frogs, one green and one white, talking to one another animatedly. The voices in the background belong to children. A joyful WhatsApp forward on a Sunday morning led us to pursue this heartwarming story of children in the bastis crafting puppets to beat the stress brought on by COVID-19. The lockdown has placed enormous economic burden on the urban poor. There is a palpable gloom produced by a normal way of life coming to a…

COVID-19 has made strong supporters of vibrant urban life shudder. They are pining for the outdoors and wondering if our current dense urban form is to be blamed for what COVID-19 has unleashed. There’s speculation around what the pandemic means for cities, and especially if it should change the current path of urbanisation. While holistic changes are welcome, many commentators have made density -- a measure of population per unit area, usually square kilometre or square mile -- the scapegoat.  On March 22nd, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, tweeted: “There is a density level in NYC that is destructive,” that…

India’s COVID-19 lockdown, one of the strictest in human history, was recently extended by the Prime Minister of India until the 3rd of May. Many stranded migrants waiting for public transport to take them back home or for production activities and markets to resume functioning were disappointed one more time, after the PM’s announcement on April 14th.  Along with poor migrants, other economically weaker sections in the city have been struggling for survival in the slums of cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Surat and Bangalore. This extension would seem like a terrible fait accompli and a final nail in the coffin…

What does a city look like? Who lives in the city? If you are thinking of the New York skyline, skyscrapers, wide roads, clean streets and cars, you are perhaps not alone. These westernized imaginings are quick to invade our mind whenever there is talk of urbanscape. However, now think consciously of the space that we inhabit, a typical Indian megacity, and our own daily experiences may present themselves as stark contradictions. Having lived in Mumbai, when I think of a city I am taken back to my daily commutes to college, in the local trains. Standing at the doorstep,…