The recent order by the Supreme Court three-judge bench that threatens the homes and livelihoods of an estimated 48,000 families living along 70 km of railway tracks because they were “encroachments which are there in the safety zones,” has understandably raised many concerns. To place this order in context it is necessary to understand the trajectory of the courts and how they have manoeuvred their way from justice into governance that does not lie within their mandate.

The theme in which this order was pronounced goes back to 1985 when a petition was filed before a three-judge bench on the pollution of the river Ganga at Haridwar but targeted the downstream tanneries at Kanpur. When the first order was given in 1987 there were 35 advocates present in court representing the municipality, the pollution control board, and the 43 tanneries. In 2020, in the same theme, the number of advocates was 417 and they represented a host of regulatory bodies, municipalities, railways, solid waste handlers, smog tower makers, standards-setting institutions, and 12 thermal power plants.

How the issue of water pollution in the Ganga is linked to air pollution, railway safety, coal-burning plants, solid waste, air purification, and slums – and the list goes on increasing – is an indication of how the Court has kept manoeuvring its mandate to converge apparently unrelated, and contradictory, issues. In the present case, the EPCA recommended that all non-degradable waste be “given to authorised waste recyclers/pickers”, but the court has responded by evicting the waste-pickers! As for the slums as a safety hazard, the Railways’ own finding is that its safety performance is dependent on how much it invests in infrastructure. 

This is not the first time the court has done this kind of manoeuvring. Other cases filed at the same time (1985) have been used to close not only 168 polluting industries (1996) but 75,000 non-conforming ones (2004); restrict diesel (1997) but also order the change from 10,000 diesel to 4,000 CNG buses (1998); ban mining (2002) while also removing 3 labour camps next to Bhatti Mines (2006); protect the Ridge (1995) but at the peril of evicting residents of 21 villages (2014). All these were based on the mistaken hope that they would stop the “adverse effect on the public at large.”

Another case before the court that addressed the issue of removal of garbage was also manoeuvred into other issues. While pulling up the municipalities for not removing garbage, the court commented that “slums are major polluters and they should be removed”. It also gratuitously observed, “Rewarding an encroacher on public land with free alternate site is like giving a reward to a pickpocket.” This casual observation has since been used by many agencies to hold the poor guilty for all problems. In addition, most courts are now following the precedent that the alleged guilty have no right to be heard.

The High Court of Delhi offers several examples of this bias. In 1994 an association of factory owners had filed a writ in this court seeking relief from congestion and the lack of facilities in their industrial area. Another association filed a similar writ for a different area in 2002. They were clubbed together and, suddenly targeting the slums – who were not heard, the Bench held that while “it is undoubtedly the duty of Government authorities to provide shelter for the under privileged”, but “we hereby proceed to squash the same (policy) which requires alternative sites to be provided to slum dwellers.”

At the same time another Bench was hearing 36 petitions by slum dwellers, along with 28 by resident welfare associations, on slum eviction.  This Bench too declined to hear the slum dwellers (arguing that the above Bench was hearing them!) but passed orders for the “demolition of all slum clusters which have come up after February 1997.” The Union Government stepped in to file a Special Leave Petition before the Supreme Court against the squashing of resettlement policy and a stay was granted by the court with the proviso that the Union could “proceed with the impugned policy”.

Faced by this turn of events the High Court then on its own decided to address the issue of slums. The Ministry of Tourism prepared a brief showing that slum dwellers were polluting the river Yamuna. The slum dwellers were not heard although a study showed that the 29 drains from their settlements carried only 0.08% of the total sewerage discharged into the river. The court merely ordered “to forthwith remove all the unauthorised structures, jhuggies, places of worship and/or any other structure which are unauthorisedly put in Yamuna Bed and its embankment, within two months from today.” This order was used to evict 60,000 families living on the river bank while ignoring the 23 encroachments on the river bed by the government, religious institutions, and residences.

In another case, the High Court gave an order to remove a settlement on the land belonging to Delhi Vidyut Board to free the road for smooth flow of traffic. The order stated, “the unauthorised occupants also have buffalos and other animals which not only give way to unhygienic conditions but also create hindrance on the smooth flow of commuters on the ring road of Delhi which are in thousands.” Thus, safety, conservation, pollution, congestion, waste, animals, hygiene, and land are all manoeuvred  to promote action against slums.

At the base of this trajectory is the fact that slums are not illegal. They are defined as unfit for human habitation, dilapidated, overcrowded; with no ventilation, narrow streets, no light or sanitation; and “detrimental to safety, health, or morals.” Also, it is the Delhi Development Authority that is responsible for creation of slums because of its failure to provide even one-third of the LIG housing that it is legally mandated to provide. The executive and the judiciary both know this and that is why the policy of resettlement exists and judgements follow from that. If slums are to be cleared or improved as per the Act, then “habitable” land becomes the critical (and expensive) issue. Proving encroachment is even more problematic because the rich have illegally occupied far more land than the poor.

That is why courts are turning to the belief that slums are “detrimental to safety, health, or morals”. Such a ‘sentiment’ requires less ‘evidence’ than property rights, occupation dates, and illegal squatting. Unless this kind of manoeuvring by a ‘committed’ judiciary and executive is challenged, and service providers held to account by an independent legislature and a free press, this trajectory is going to continue.

*The author is Director, Hazards Centre

Related:

SC directs 48,000 shanties to be razed along railways track in Delhi
Over 50 percent exposed to Coronavirus in Mumbai slums: Sero survey
Homes of migrant labourers burnt down my miscreants in Bengaluru

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There is a major calamity brewing. State governments that are unable to respond, because they are hemmed in by an unsympathetic Union, are faced by a people desperate for survival, not only from disease, but from hunger and violence. While everyone looks to governments to somehow get their act together, is it possible to look to ordinary, working people (not NGOs) to release their creativity? Some clues may lie in the existing practice of workers’ organisations.

The pandemic that gives rise to social distancing also creates the conditions for social solidarity. Today domestic maids find that, with the home-stay in force, “madams are now working from home”, so they don’t have to wake up at the crack of dawn and can go at any time during the day. Now that more office-goers are working from home, delivery boys are making more runs delivering food. For bosses who have their own business, drivers are driving but with protection of masks and sanitizers.

The imagination has to recall the 1897 bubonic plague that hit Maharashtra. It was the courageous Savitribai Phule, and her adopted son Yashwantrao, who opened a clinic at the outskirts of Pune as part of the social reform movement. Yashwantrao died while serving patients of all castes and communities. The same kind of social solidarity was demonstrated by Dwarkanath Kotnis in 1938, when he died in service while providing medical assistance to the Chinese in wartime.

Even during the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 in Philadelphia 2,000 nuns, with little experience and training, answered their Archbishop’s call, signing on for 12-hour shifts. They washed linens, served soup, mixed medicine; provided water, blankets, and comfort. One remembered she was struck with “fearful dread”, yet plunged on. And now the Cubans are demonstrating the same courage, love, and solidarity in serving the world.

The Kerala government has led the way in promoting transparent solidarity practices. It has set aside Rs 20,000 crore for payment of pensions, free food-grains for all, subsidised meals, loans for the needy and other measures. It has turned all government hostels into isolation centres and put in place a contact-tracing system to isolate the disease instead of harshly and insensibly locking down. But its main allies have been the mass organisations of workers, women, and youth.

NGOs have proposed that food be delivered to every door or at PDS shops to anyone, by Local Bodies and the Food Department. But does not the real strength of a community lie within itself? Cannot they mobilise to set up community kitchens to both prepare cooked food as well as distribute it among those who need it most? The capital cost of such a kitchen for 200 people is roughly Rs 50,000, with Rs 50,000 more for daily running costs. Can it become a point of solidarity for committees, information, and support?

Along with food, a useful addition may be slice of lemon or the traditional shikanji[1] replacing tea. Lemon contains vitamin C that may help in preventing infection in the respiratory tract, especially in people with low diets and high physical stress. Sitting out in the sun will also help the body produce vitamin D that helps the body fight respiratory illness. Does the kitchen give an opportunity to reclaim the common space where both distance and solidarity are possible?

Migrants ask for vehicles to go back home;sex workers want access to ART tablets; domestic workers look for online payment; street vendors need space to sell; garment workers don’t know how to get advance payments; piece-rated workers search for jobs; and powrakarmikas[2] struggle against untouchability. Does not every one of these represent an opportunity for solidarity actions, for launching collective enterprises by workers that provide cheap transport, health, information, e-skills, job placements, and legal support?

Masks are needed for health care and sanitation workers, and infected persons. They are made from non-woven Polypropylene fabric of grade GSM 60. The same fabric is used for the production of carry bags but of grade GSM 20. Hence, it is possible to purchase GSM 60 fabric, or use disposed carry-bags, for home-based production of masks by stitching four layers for the correct grade. In Kerala and Assam mass-production has been done in jails and homes.Can the same be done for gloves?

Even more urgent is the requirement for hand-washing but the everyday struggle for adequate water faces most workers and their families. Community hand-washing stations using home-made soap and minimal water through home-made dispensers are a practical possibility. Water, with 1% bleach or 10% vinegar added to it has a limited disinfectant effect, but will need to be washed off quickly with water as it harms the skin. So could a two-bucket station that saves water be explored?

Another area for collective action is in identifying sick people and contact-tracing through quick surveys. Only four questions are needed: Have you been to an affected area? Do you have a fever? Do you have persistent/dry cough? Do you have breathlessness? The addition of a Pulse Oximeter App enables checking for fever and blood oxygen saturation. If there is shortness of breath but the oxygen level is over 95% then medical care is not needed.

The funds needed for all these activities can come from Welfare Boards or credit institutions, ULBs, Panchayats, elected representatives, State Disaster Relief Funds, or individual donors. These are the funds that at least nine state governments (including Kerala) have leveraged while others are slow in following. The essential point, though, is how workers’ organisations can demand these funds to promote social solidarity rather than distancing.

Mobilised communities can be extremely effective within their settlements in identifying families in need of assistance; locating empty jhonpris[3] or plots, even houses and trees, in their localities to act as quarantine quarters; persuading potential carriers to self-quarantine; resolving conflicts early; and providing information: all within the frame of the 73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendments. But could they demand decentralisation to the voting booth level – catering to 1,000 voters?

Do testing kits fall within the frame of solidarity action? Collecting samples is fairly simple. The test procedureis more complex. A kit can be developed in six days, and 15 lakh manufactured each week. Some technologists claim to have already made cheap kits. But the question pro-people scientists, lawyers, managers, engineers, and others have to ask is how to demystify the science, make it simpler, aid collective research and production in workers’ settlements,and reduce the epidemic.

That leaves two obstacles in the actual designing and implementation of such initiatives.

The first is the state of lockdown. Relief work is a good way for people to assemble for care, reduce helplessness and increase empathy. The layouts of the basti[4] and the tola[5] provide the architecture for mobilisation. Provisions – like “acting in good faith” (Epidemic Diseases Act 1897); “involvement of voluntary social-welfare institutions” (Disaster Management Act 2005); no protocol for “lockdown” (Section 144);and “delivery of essential goods” (MHAGuidelines) – can be leveraged by alliances of working people to negotiate the rules for “lockdown”.

The second is how much activists will move beyond relief to mobilising the working poor to meet their own needs: using empowerment to lay claims on government, and reclaiming their rights.That may happen through local discussions about how public infrastructure is being privatized. Do people want food as welfare, or do they wish to decide what food to produce? Do they want funds to be doled out, or do they demand the right to determine how funds will be used? Do they want to be locked up, or do they demand that the government perform its duty? Back in the village, do they want to return to the city, or to restructure the village? – questions that could point to an alternative social organisation.

And, with Pantho Kanai, ring a different bell:

Ghontabajao, doptori

Aar koto din dekhte hobe

Natai baibharo binghuri

Din dupure noshto korbi

Kore jabe monchuri

Ghontabajao, doptori…[6]

(Dunu Roy is Director, Hazards Centre).

___________________________________________

1. Lemonade

2. Sanitation workers

3. Hutments

4. Informal settlement

5. Part of the village reserved for the lower class/caste

6. Ring the bell record-keeper; How many days have we to wait; The spool endlessly reels out the kite; Day and noon you waste; You continue stealing my mind; Ring the bell record-keeper

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