Dharavi Slum Tour

Less than a 10 minute taxi-ride from where I am currently living is the biggest slum in Asia. It is called Dharavi and is estimated to house 1 million people, though 3 million unofficially (and more realistically). If I remember correctly, it occupies 1.5 hectares squared of land.

The above photo is where plastic for recycling is laid out to dry. We went up on the tin roof, where this man is standing. From here you can see the entire slum. It is extraordinary. Breathteaking. And heartbreaking.

Here, the plastic has been melted down and is being cooled in strips. They will then be cut into pellets and dyed. The pellets will be sold back to plastics companies. Workers spend 12-14 hours a day in these make-shift plants.

Here, paint cans are cleaned and repaired. They, too, will be sold back to manufacturers. The estimated turn over in the slum is $665 million (American) annually. All industry here is illegual because it does not conform with environmental standards. Taxes are still paid to the governement, nonetheless. The days are long and the work is hard, but Dharavi can sustain itself independently. Other slum dwellers rely on contract work. They wait for hours starting at 6:30 am to see if they will be chosen to work that day. If they are not, they wait until the next day. And do nothing in between.

There are 7 toilets for thousands of residents. The passageways between the houses are so narrow that only one person can pass at a time. I often have to duck to avoid hitting my head against hanging branches, wires and god know's what. The pavement is cracked and stepping wrongly sends dirty water shooting up over my feet and calves. The insides of homes look clean, some lit with the intimate glow of a television screen. Open sewers run along the ground with translucent sludge flowing through them.

The slum, which is legal (because it was 'built' before 1995 and the law changed) will be gradually torn down over the next two years. Housing complexes will go up in its place and the residents will be given a room 2-3 m2 in size per family. The industry will no longer exist. Those who do can not be accommodated by the new residences will be shipped outside of the city.

Here, they have schools (though crowded) and water (though only a few hours a day) and most importantly they have each other. I have never felt a sense of community as I did visiting this place. I read that the residents are not worried about loosing their homes, so much as feeling lonely in the next complexes. I think that that is probably true.

All the photos were provided by the tour company. We were not allowed to take photos during the tour, to show respect for the people living there. I asked the director of the tour company how the residents felt about tourists coming into their living space. He said that initially they were very angry, but now they understand that the foreigners just want to understand how they live. During the tour, the people in the Dharavi slum took pictures of us. I feel that that is fair.