Slum-free India

Slum-free India

 Available evidences indicate that the number of slums and the slum population in India have been growing. Estimates show that nearly 28 million people lived in the slums in 1981, accounting for 17.5 percent of the urban population. In 1991, the number of slum dwellers rose to 45.7 million, accounting for 21.5 percent of the total population in urban areas. According to the estimate made by the Committee on Slum Statistics/Census the slum population constituted 75.26 million (26.31 percent) out of the 286 million urban population of the country in 2001. As per the estimates, the slum population of India is estimated to have reached 93.06 million in 2011. Slums are found to exist in almost all the cities and towns throughout the country. The goal of making Indian cities slum-free is a stupendous task unparalleled in history. For instance after taking into account various facets of the task of upgrading the life and living conditions of the slum dwellers around the world, the United Nations Millennium Submit (in 2000) decided to take up the task of improving of the living condition and living environment of only 100 million slum dwellers around the world over a period of 20 years from 2000. Therefore, the task of lifting nearly 93 million urban slum dwellers out of poverty and squalor and thereby vanish the slums from Indian cities/towns is really ambitious. Finding resources for the scheme may not be an easy task. Apart from the difficulty in raising the enormous funds required to meet the expenditure for implementing the scheme, there is serious difficulty in implementing such a gigantic scheme due to the weak, inefficient and corrupt administrative machinery. As the plan to make Indian cities slum free entails huge expenditure to the tune of lakhs of crores of rupees, unless suitable measures are undertaken to curb delay in the execution of the projects and to trim down corruption, the success of this scheme seems to be uncertain. The recent revelation of large-scale corruption, embezzlement by bureaucrats, politicians, private contractors and others in the execution of works related to Commonwealth Games and other large projects is an eye opener. The mission to eradicate slums over a short period is a gigantic task. Of course it is a laudable and a daring attempt, but an amazing venture. All-out efforts will have to be put forth, both by the central/state governments, municipal administrations and NGOs to realise the goal. Unless solid steps are taken to prevent the sprouting of new slums, besides resettling and rehabilitating the existing slum dwellers, the praiseworthy goal of slum-free cities might turn out to be a Sisyphus Challenge for India.