The thing about India is that it is a land of extreme contrasts. In addition to having some of the most expensive homes in the world, there also is extreme poverty and dire living conditions. Unfortunately, extreme poverty still exists within India, and which leads to several human rights issues. The first step to addressing these human rights issues is simply raising awareness, which is why I share their stories with you.
Inside Mumbai, India’s largest city, is Dharavi, the largest slum in Asia and the second-largest slum in the world. It’s practically a city within a city, as millions of people reside within it. The quality of the dwellings vary, and some are actually very nice homes. The traditional definition of a slum has nothing to do with the actual living conditions of the area but the fact that it is a settlement illegally constructed on property not owned by the residents.
One of the first sites that we came across was a large complex known locally as “The Laundry,” where thousands of people would come to hand wash their clothes (some of the residents owned only one or two sets of clothing), sheets, and in some instances, towels and sheets from hotels and hospitals in the area. In one section of the slum, houses were shoved up against the barbed wire fencing of the airport, and children were running one hundred feet from where the planes were taking off. There were many openings where children could sneak out onto the runway, and even children who stayed off the tarmac ended up with permanent hearing damage from living directly next to a large international airport where planes were taking off every few minutes.
Within the slums, we passed by a medical clinic – though it had nothing more than a dirt floor, table, and the occasional rusty medical device here and there. This was where the slum dwellers went to get their healthcare, if they were lucky enough to afford it at all. In addition to expensive private healthcare clinics, there were government-operated hospitals where patients could receive care for a low cost or free, however, basically, as it was explained to me by a resident of Dharavi, these hospitals were a last resort where people went to die, because it was easier for a live person to limp to the hospital than to have to arrange for several people to carry the corpse, which is also considered to be “unclean” in many of the religious traditions of India. A lack of public health infrastructure meant that it could be days before a deceased individual could be removed from the slums, which creates a major health risk for the inhabitants. So, in some cases, checking into a government-run hospital in India is like climbing into your own coffin.
The risk of disease in the slums is high, and epidemics frequently strike the slums due to a high concentration of people in a small area and poor infrastructure. Pesticides are frequently used in the slums, which affects the children in particular, who do not have the antibodies to fight off the pesticide, and, as a result, become extremely ill, permanently disabled, or sometimes die. Within the slums, there are many stray dogs, which creates a major public health issue as a slum dweller is bitten by a dog every two seconds, and, in many cases, the individual bitten is infected with a deadly disease such as rabies. Many of Dharavi’s residents believe that there is a conspiracy by the Indian government to release rabies-infected dogs into the slums to reduce the number of slum dwellers so that they can build over the land.
Due to inadequate medical care, the intentional handicapping of people for the purposes of gaining more money from begging, or simple bad luck, there are many handicapped individuals living in the slums who are unable to join the workforce and earn a living to provide for themselves and their families. One man with an amputated leg was, due to an inability to afford crutches, basically crab-walking on his hands and one good leg through the streets of the city and the slum and through unsanitary conditions and toxic chemicals.
Unfortunately, the slum dwellers are seen as fortunate in comparison to some of Mumbai’s other residents. The poorest of the poor, the “street sleepers,” make up a large portion of the urban population. At my hotel, I could see some of the street sleepers from outside my window, which included women, children, and the elderly, who were lying on a hard concrete floor, sometimes without a pillow, blanket, or cushion between them. Each night, I saw a woman in the park across the street from my hotel sleeping on the concrete with her toddler. The woman appeared to be pregnant, and there was no one to watch out for them to make sure they were safe, a dangerous situation given that the streets of Mumbai were so unsafe for a woman that I was not allowed outside of the hotel after dark, and the recent gang rapes and murders of women on buses in the city.
Out of sheer desperation to spare their children from a life of poverty and suffering, some of the poorest parents would kill their own children and newborns. Unable to feed another child, good, kind people are being forced out of desperation to kill their own children to protect them from the pain of starvation, disease, and poverty. In many circumstances, it is regarded as an act of sympathy. Desperate for some income to feed themselves and their other children, sometimes the parents would then sell their own children’s dead bodies on the black market so that their organs can be sold on the black market.
While there are many challenges facing India, there is also massive improvement and economic growth occurring on a daily basis. Within the next twenty years, India will develop an even stronger middle class and become a major actor on the global political and economic stage. Businesses are developing, which will bring a multitude of benefits for the Indian economy and day-to-day lives of its citizens, which will – hopefully – bring an end to some of these struggles that individuals are facing and improve their quality of life. Additionally, providing vocational opportunities and improving conditions in the slum is not simply a human rights issue – it is an economic issue. With millions of residents, the slum possesses a huge resource of human capital that is not being fully maximized. Expanding job opportunities and education for slum dwellers will not only improve their quality of life and raise their incomes – it will also greatly benefit the Indian economy as a whole as it becomes one of the world’s major industrial centers.
tryingtobekatemiddleton 