Lack of ID papers delay biggest slum survey

Mumbai: On missing the documents, a survey of Mumbai’s slums to establish which residents are eligible for rehousing is being delayed and criticised by activists who say the effort will fail unless the rights of all slum dwellers are recognised.

As part of the survey, residents deemed eligible to be rehoused must provide SRA officials with details of the size of their family, their income, rent receipts, electricity bills and other proof of residence before being given a special ID card. More than 55 percent of the city’s 20 million inhabitants live in overcrowded and unsanitary slums, according to the state-run Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA), which plans to poll more than 200,000 residential and commercial establishments in Mumbai’s slums by the end of 2016.

S.L Zanke, a senior SRA official said “It is a very big survey, possibly the biggest such survey we have done of Mumbai slums. But many of the people don’t have the necessary documents, so it is getting delayed. We have not even finished half.”