identity

Proving ones identity seems to be one of the core issues that poor people face.  Most people in India-- about 60%-- are born in their homes, but birth certificates are issued in hospitals.  Also, the Panchayati Raj-- the local government council in each village-- issues ration cards, but in practice, the well-off members of a village tend to have them, while the rest of the people don't.  Many people are just not given proof of identity by their government institutions.  The funny thing is, India is an extremely bureaucratized place, and people need to produce a proof of identity to have any interaction with the government, and for many private commercial activities, like opening a  bank account, having a secure residence, getting a mobile phone, sending kids to school, having a major procedure at a hospital, getting (officially) married, getting a passport, voting.  The list is quite long.  In the United States, people also need to show identification for this stuff, but the difference here is that its not within many peoples' means to actually get that documentation.  

The main ID document is the ration card.  Its issued by family, and minors can get their own when they turn 18.  There's also something called a voter I-card... it is issued to individual adults when elections are held.   For migrants in Mumbai (and anywhere else), in order to be issued a ration card or a voter card, they have to prove that their name doesn't already exist on voter rolls or ration cards elsewhere.  In a lot of cases, they just sign an affidavit declaring that.  But even once that is signed and they have gone through the appropriate legal channels, its still hard to get identification for a variety of reasons.  Government officials often tack on more requirements than the law requires, and also require bribes.  In Mumbai, its a bit easier to get it done if you speak Marathi.  The BMC is a Maharashtran-dominated place, and they seem to give north Indian migrants a harder time.

The need to establish an identity has created a huge blackmarket for documents-- there are lots of forgeries (and people pay a lot for them).  That creates a big public administration problem.  It means there are tons of people with fake identities-- names that only exist on paper-- that are enrolled in school, on voter rolls, etc.  And if you go through official channels, since you probably have to pay a hefty bribe to get what you need, the process of obtaining an identity may be out of reach for the poorest people.  These are my preliminary impressions after a few conversations, I will have to verify everything and dig deeper...

Having this control over identity seems to be a major way that the state government can control its population, and maybe discriminate against migrants from other places.  In Maharashtra, the official policy is that once a migrant has been a resident of the state for a certain number of years, they are automatically entitled to a ration card.  In practice, of course, this doesn't bear out.  

Some NGOs have started issuing their own identity documents that have information like pictures, names, ages and blood types.  The identity cards I saw said "LEARN Mahila Kamgar Sangathan"  (LEARN Women Worker's Group) across the top, which meant that the women had an automatic way to show that they were part of an organization that could vouch for their reliability or character.  And while these cards aren't useful for government business, they are accepted by banks.  So since the women can open bank accounts with them, they have a good way to document their length of residence.  Since the government seems either unfair or rather dysfunctional in this matter, its like the NGOs are stepping in and taking its place.

I really want to find out more about this identification issue.  I think it might have interesting connections to my project, which is broadly about citizenship and what makes someone a citizen of a place.

food

I have consumed ridiculous quantities of food today.  I had a big breakfast because I didn't know exactly when I would be home after attending the meeting of the women's organization in Dharavi.   Around mid-morning, I went over to Zakir Uncle and Shehnaz Aunty's house-- their flat is directly upstairs.  They are fun to talk to and extremely welcoming... they invited me to lunch.  Shehnaz Aunty is a really good cook and she made fish in two different ways, both delicious.  Although they were not satisfied with my level of food consumption, I did my best... I was really full when I left.  Then, in the early evening, I met Indira, who is about my age and is a researcher and organizer with LEARN India, and she took me over to the women's meeting in Dharavi.  Only, it had been canceled.  So since we had time on our hands, she took me back to her place (a lovely apartment on the 29th floor overlooking the coast) and I hung out with her and her husband.  We went out to an extravagant dinner-- Chinese food.  I think I've felt overfed for about 14 straight hours now.

While I'm on the topic of food,  I also had two dosas yesterday... one in a restaurant with Qusay Uncle and Alifiah Aunty and one on the street with Maimoona.  Both were just excellent.  And earlier yesterday, I had gone to visit Masi Khadija, one of Dadi's sisters.  (I've heard so much about her from Dadi, it was nice to finally meet her.  She was really sweet).  As I was leaving, she brought me a glass of coconut water, and I downed it, because Shabbir uncle was waiting for me downstairs.   And then he insisted that I try some fresh orange juice (not orange, actually... it was a fruit they call a sweet lime (mosambi) that tasted suspiciously like an orange to me) from a street vendor... and I downed that too.  Here, people seem to drink things all at once... no such thing as small sips or nursing a drink.  I felt I had to keep pace.  By that time, I really did feel like my stomach was going to burst!   

So Bombay is a yummy place.

(And yet, so many people are hungry.  I have instituted a policy that if I buy myself a drink or a snack on the street, and if there is a child begging nearby, I get him/her something too.  And the funny thing is, I still end up spending under a dollar or two).

Here is the view from Indira's apt:

 

Mahila Sangathna

Mahila Sangathna means women's organization.  I met up with the members of one yesterday while they were holding a rally to agitate for ration cards.  There were about 50 women, maybe more, and they marched through several main roads in the Dharavi area and arrived at the Dharavi ration card office.

Most of them were long term residents of Mumbai, but with family roots elsewhere, and others had moved to they city several years ago.  They had all applied for ration cards through the correct channels but to no avail.  After months of petitioning the office responsible for issuing them and getting nowhere, they were holding a public demonstration.  It was friendly and very peaceful... just a loudspeaker and several speeches about their commitment to this issue and the injustice of their situation.  Such rallies (murcha, in Hindi) happen frequently all over Mumbai as well as the rest of India, and from what I understand so far, they are a very usual form of protest.  Kind of like burning cars in France.  Though a few years ago, the Maharashtra high court made them illegal in South Mumbai-- where there is the most development-- so now they are confined to the suburbs. 

I interviewed several women.  Initially I was just talking to one person, and other women slowly joined the conversation, until I was listening to a group of five or six tag-teaming the same basic story.  They have been in Mumbai for a long time, but most of them had roots elsewhere.  They were from all over the place-- Madras, Karnataka, UP, Bihar, elsewhere in Maharashtra.  One woman there said she was born in Mumbai, although her parents still live in the south.  She had never been to their home.  So she was not technically a migrant-- Mumbai is the only home she has known-- but for the purposes of establishing residency and having access to government services, she has the same issues as her companions because her family originates from elsewhere.   The women need the city to give them ration cards so they can do simple things like enroll their kids in government schools, have access to water and electricity and get subsidized rates for certain goods. 

This group is organized through LEARN- the Labor, Education and Research Network.  The women meet on a regular schedule several times a month, and no one seems to mind if I show up at their meetings... so that's what I'll be doing on Friday and Sunday evenings!

One of the NGO leaders I talked to made the distinction between the right of free movement-- which the Indian constitution guarantees to everyone-- and the right of residency and services.  So as an Indian citizen, even if you are allowed to move freely within India, its kind of unclear whether you have a constitutional right to expect to be treated like the residents of your new location.  Something I have to look into.

 


While I was in Dharavi, I also met a really nice guy, named Pradeep, from an organization called NIRMAN.  The group focuses on the similar issues-- migrant rights, standards of living for slum-dwellers, and especially, labor rights.  Pradeep met me at the Dharavi police station, and we walked through tiny little allies, lined with food and merchandise stalls, entrances to apartment buildings, lots of goats and just a ton of people.  Incredibly, it really wasn't that dirty.  (I guess that judgement is totally relative... I just mean not that dirty in comparison to other places I've been in Mumbai so far :)

Anyway, he took about 45 mintues to tell me about his organization, and invited me to attend job training programs for (mainly migrant) construction workers and see the NGO at work.  I hope to do that next week.  I also met his colleague, Prem, who works specifically with Tamil migrants, providing them resources and community support for getting along in Mumbai.  I hope to get to know him and his work as well.

These guys have deep links with the Brihan Mumbai Corporation (the municipal government) and private companies, they run really extensive and effective programs, and impact the lives of thousands of people.  And their Dharavi headquarters are just a very modest couple of rooms with some chairs and a computer.  Talk about low overhead.

I haven't really seen the slum part of Dharavi yet, I don't think.  I went to places that seemed pretty well developed... Pradeep said that is due to the fact that developers have been razing slums and encroaching into this area for decades now.  He didn't think development was a bad thing... he likes the spread of infrastructure, services and commerce.  And his organization basically works to mitigate the negative effects, like dislocation and higher costs of living.

RCUES

RCUES is the Regional Centre for Urban and Environmental Studies, part of the All-India Institute of Local Self Government.  Dr. Sneha Palnitkar is the director.  I had an encouraging meeting with her yesterday.

I learned about the center's work, which focuses on research about urban administration, poverty, sanitation and related issues, and also trains government officials on these subjects.  It has several offices across the country, and is the only organization of its scale that works on these kinds of issues.  Dr. Sneha is a really knowledgable and well-connected person, and she has offered to faciliate my meetings with any public officials.  I just have to figure out exactly who I want to talk to and get back to her.  I think that once I start volunteering with an NGO (which may begin today!), I will have a better idea of the kind of questions I have on the government side of things.  She also handed me a hefty pile of literature that I'm going to start reading today.  A lot of it is specifically about local citizenship and political participation.  She told me to come back as often as I want with my questions and ideas, and I will definitely take her up on that.  Especially considering what a busy person she is, I'm really grateful that she has extended her help to me to this degree.

I got kind of a kick out of the actual visit to the office as well.  When I got there, Dr. Sneha had a few other meetings, so I waited for her in the lounge.  I was immediately brought a cup of tea.  It felt very... high brow.  But its just the way things are done.  Whenever you go to a professional meeting with someone, they seem to go out of their way to treat you like a a guest.  At the very least, they offer water and tea, and maybe some chocolates.

 

tv

I got slightly lost yesterday, and ended up on the wrong side of the train station.  On the side I'm staying, its a crowded marketplace, but its clearly bustling and flourishing.  The side I ended up on was a lot more depressed, more slum-like housing and not too much commerical activity.  I was walking by a row of what looked like pretty makeshift shelters to me... they were basicaly boxes built against the boundary wall of the train station, with corrugated metal roofs and drapes across long wooden poles for walls and entrances.  But when I glanced inside one, I saw an entire family lounging on some pillows watching TV.  I was so surprised to see that they were wired!  They looked kind of like this...

 

Its kind of funny when you compare it to my own inability to watch tv... I need to show proof of residency in order to have a cable box set-up, so I decided to skip it because I don't watch too much tv.