Tughlakabad is adjacent to affluent neighbourhoods like C.R Park and Greater Kailash, highlighting the stark inequality that exists not only in human rights reports but also in the lived experiences of its inhabitants.

As reported earlier, the  Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) carried out a demolition drive in the area in the first week of May, leaving thousands of residents here homeless, without providing any rehabilitation. The area’s economic profile indicates that it primarily comprises a working-class community where residents work as domestic help, security guards, street vendors and factory workers. Most women workers work in the nearby area of C.R Park and Greater Kailash as domestic help.

The demolition drive has resulted in homelessness for the residents of the area, who are now facing several other social issues ranging from women’s safety to lack of education and hunger.

Homelessness and Hunger

Two primary issues that have become the talking point being repeated by each community member here are homelessness and hunger. Despite the demolition that has left no trace of homes, the area’s residents have refused to leave. Most of the families here have set up tents in the same place where once their houses stood. Others have started shifting towards the adjacent jungle.

Additionally, the locals report a sharp rise in rent in the surrounding area with at least a 20% -30% rise. Sarita Devi’s tent in the jungle validates this fact. Due to the high rent, she couldn’t afford a house in the surrounding area. She works as a domestic help in CR Park and is now forced to live with her four kids in a tent.

The other woman in the area echoed her concern and other issues, such that landlords prefer to rent properties to families with fewer people. Due to this, Sindhu (31) and her four children are staying in a tent on the debris of their former home.

“They want small families to rent out their properties. If someone with four children approaches the landlords, it’s a straight rejection for them. Also, even if someone rents the property to a large family, the rent is skyrocketing. We can’t afford that much,” she added.

Amid the scorching heat of May in the national capital, the inability to have two square meals a day has become a primary concern for families here in Tughlakabad. Many women reportedly here have been unable to go to work for the past week and have not received any aid or assistance from civil society organisations in the form of food or water. Giving an example of the lack of empathy towards the residents here, Ritu (35) pointed out

“The NGO here is distributing food to the stray dogs, but they can’t see thousands of human beings with hungry stomachs,” she said. Also, the lack of support has been exacerbated by the scorching heat.

“The combination of inflation and high prices makes it difficult to afford food from outside sources. The demolition not only took away our homes but threatened our lives,” she added.

Women’s Safety and the Future of Education

Women’s safety has emerged as a significant concern among the residents who have set up their tents around the nearby jungles. Sarita expressed her fear of drunk men, which has increased since the demolition drive. She is worried about her elder daughter, who is 15 years old and has to leave her at her workplace in CR Park. She moves back and forth between the protest site and the tent during the day, as leaving the tent unattended would result in losing all her belongings.

The fear of women’s safety has been a recurring theme among the residents, especially women. Protesters here also question the PM’s much-used slogan ‘Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao’, which according to them, is nothing but a farce.

Another concern that has been grappling the residents with anger and anxiety is the loss of education that their children are enduring due to the demolition.  Laxmi(40), a mother of three, has worked in the factory for the last nine years. She, along with her family, has been living in the area for the last eight years. She alleged that due to the sudden eviction, she did not get time to collect her belongings and documents of her children.

“I didn’t want my children to work in the factory like me. Now their documents are lying under this debris. The way this eviction took place, it didn’t even give us time to collect the educational documents of my children,” she said.

Since the demolition drive, the locality kids have stopped going to school. Several parents here have received calls from the schools threatening to cancel the admission of their children in case of more absences. The parents can also not provide a stable environment for the children due to the lack of housing, electricity, and water. The loss of education due to this drive also raised some serious questions about the government—commitment towards the right to education.

The residents also questioned the way the drive was organised. According to them, no notice was served to them before the drive. The only notice sent out to them by the ASI was sent in January.

“The officials should have informed them a week or at least 24 hours before uprooting a population of almost 20,000,” added Laxmi.

Speaking with NewsClick, ASI’s spokesperson Vasant Kumar Swarnkar defended the government’s position on how the demolition occurred. According to Mr Swarnkar, the residents were served with a notice in the month of January only and given a time of 15 days to evict the area. He further said the ASI can not harbour illegal construction around archaeological sites.

Regarding providing rehabilitation to the residents, he stated, “Rehabilitation is a matter of the state, and ASI can not comment on the matter of the state.”

Political Class’s Lack of Empathy

It is a point to note that the ruling parties, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Delhi and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at the Centre, have not shown much interest in the issues that the residents are facing here. The lack of empathy from their representative was visible in the conversations that were taking place at the protest site. The locals had reported that when they met the local MP Ramesh Bidhuri in January to help them, he accused them of voting for AAP in the local Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) election and used abusive language towards them. NewsClick also attempted to contact Mr Bidhuri at his residence in the same area, but he was unavailable as he had gone to Karnataka for the upcoming assembly election.

However, the Delhi Urban Development Minister Saurabh Bharadwaj from the AAP has suggested that alternative arrangements should be made for the displaced residents of Tughlakabad whose homes have been demolished. Still, no representative from his party has met the victims yet.

Courtesy: Newsclick

The post Aftermath of Demolition Drive in Tughlakabad: Hunger and Homelessness Rife appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The images can be viewed here:

In the name of illegal encroachment, nearly 1000 homes were demolished in Delhi’s Tughlakabad, leaving thousands homeless without any consideration for their resettlement.
Photos by @meerfaisal01 pic.twitter.com/JCQXIr4csO

The action came a week after the Delhi High Court directed the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) on April 24, 2023, to remove encroachments in and around Tughlakabad Fort within four weeks. The drive was carried out under the supervision of a team of officials from the South East Delhi district administration, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), the Delhi Police and the ASI.

Brief Background of the Area:

In 1995, an area of over 2,000 bighas around the Tughalaqbad Fort was given to the ASI by the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) for maintenance purposes. Section 19 of The Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act (1958) clearly states that no one can construct any structure in this protected area. Additionally, section 20 of the same act prohibits any new construction within 100 meters of the protected area.

Background of the legal decisions surrounding the area:

These demolitions in Tughlakabad are not new. In 2016, the Supreme Court had ordered the ASI to prevent land grabbing and encroachment in the area. However, the residents claimed that they had received no communication from the ASI until January 11 of this year. In January 2023, the ASI (Archaeological Survey of India) declared that construction in the area was illegal and that it was an archaeological site. A notice was served on nearly 1,000 families, representing 2.5 lakh residents of Delhi’s Tughlakabad Fort area, asking them to vacate their homes. Residents were initially asked to vacate the area by January 26, but after the Delhi High Court’s intervention, the demolition was halted. However, this did not last long.

Basing its decision on the 2016 Supreme Court order, the Delhi High Court later directed the ASI to “remove unauthorised construction as well as encroachers from public land” in February of this year. The court also stated that the ASI must provide rehabilitation for people living in the Tughlakabad area. However, no alternative living space was provided to the affected residents.

On April 24, the Delhi High Court issued an order for the removal of illegal encroachers, and on April 26, the citizen received a notice declaring that all houses in the area would be razed within four weeks. On May 1, the Supreme Court had refused to stay the demolition drive to remove encroachment from Tughlakabad area in South Delhi.

While the demolitions were to start on May 1, the bulldozers reached the area on April 30 itself. The demolition drive not only left hundreds of individuals homeless but also deprived them of basic amenities, education, and shattered their dreams. The ASI on Sunday and Monday, demolished more than a thousand houses in the Bengali colony in Churiya Mohalla Tughlakabad in Delhi, leaving thousands of homeless individuals without shelter. Many of these individuals were employed in menial work such as housemaids, labourers, drivers, and local chefs.

It is crucial to note that while the authorities were eager to demolish the houses in the area, they did not deem it necessary to follow the full order of the court and provide rehabilitation to the ones rendered homeless.

The current situation- the bricks, broken roofs and inhumanity

Visuals of people crying in Tughlakabad village, with some trying to save everything they could, and children seeking shelter from the pouring rain wherever they could, resulted in a sight that made the dark clouds over Delhi appear even darker. The helpless locals have expressed their rage at local politicians, accusing them of making empty promises and ignoring their plight.

This sight emphasizes the need for proper rehabilitation for individuals who have been impacted by such a drive, as people have now been forced to relocate to a nearby forest, living in makeshift tents, bringing forth a picture of the deplorable state of homelessness that these National Capital citizens are now facing. The majority of people in Tughlakabad come from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. They work as domestic workers in affluent city households.

On the first day of demolition, nearly 50-60 houses were demolished. The ASI continued its demolition drive in the area for the second day, razing hundreds of houses, and these bulldozers have now run over nearly 100 houses.

Residents claimed that they did not receive any notice this time, but learned that the court had ordered people to leave the area immediately before the demolitions began. The displaced residents claim that they paid money to the police, ASI, and fort authorities to purchase these houses. Many of them had bills and other proof that they had lived at the same address for 20-30 years. While the procedure of law was used in approaching these demolition, the question that arises is why, instead of taking action against these innocent people, action was not taken against the officials whose negligence resulted in the encroachment of the land, as well as those who profited in the millions of rupees? As the people in the national capital sits in their comfortable homes, who will fight for the rights of these innocents, who will now have to plead and appease the authorities in order to get the compensation and rehabilitation they were guaranteed?

Related:

Maharashtra Govt compelled to withdraw 144 orders against residents & protesters: Barsu Refinery
Gauhati HC raps Assam govt over miserable condition of shelter homes where people of one community are housed Gauhati HC orders the Assam Govt to rehabilitate the remaining families rendered homeless in eviction drives
Even “encroachers” need to be rehabilitated says Courts
Bombay HC seeks policy on old settlements for protected monuments; stays evictions at Vishalgarh
Evictions are at an all-time high as bulldozers gain momentum in the country

The post Tughlakabad Demolition: Dark day for the National Capital as hundreds rendered homeless appeared first on SabrangIndia.