Ghar Bachao Ghar Banao Andolan ~ Simpreet Singh

The urban poor in Mumbai play critical roles in providing services and subsidizing the cost of living. However, they have been the first ones to be sacrificed at the altar of development in this era of globalization. The drive to make Mumbai equal to Shanghai was given shape in the Vision Mumbai plan by a multinational company McKinsey International at the request of an NGO Mumbai First, which was supported by industrialists, builders, politicians and bureaucrats. Needless to say, the development plan had no space for more that half the population that resides here.

It is ironical how the more the government speaks of economic growth, the more the poor find themselves dispossessed. The real estate market boom resulted in brutal and massive slum demolitions - on an unprecedented scale in 2004. The blatant violation of human rights of the dalits, minorities and women could not be ignored. This was the backdrop against which a collective struggle by people was started under the name of Ghar Bachao Ghar Banao Andolan. This is also a part of the National Alliance of People's Movements. It is a movement of slum dwellers, SRA affected and the unorganized sector workers. The main issue is not just a fight for housing - it is for development with justice and equity. It therefore fights corruption, malpractices and protests against accumulation of resources like land in the hands of a few.

The GBGB movement is currently dealing in those slums of Mumbai which have been demolished in or after 2004. It works with the affected community and inculcates leadership from within the community. It believes that right of housing is a basic human right and Government cannot deny it just on the basis of 'illegality'. It advocates the Constitution of India, fundamental rights and directive principles of state policy - which includes guaranteeing shelter and other basic services and right to livelihood. It believes in the framework of equity and justice which is required to be the basis for development planning as a whole and housing projects especially. Poor localities in urban areas need to be seen not as illegal encroachments but as service guilds.

Tuesday, November 6, 2012: Last month, Mumbai mourned filmmaker Yash Chopra's death from the deadly dengue. It seemed such an impossible end for someone who dreamed life on such a large canvas. Few people's attention turned to the fact that another well-known Mumbaikar, Simpreet Singh, was battling for life following a severe attack of dengue and the ensuing hepatitis in a hospital in Navi Mumbai.

Simpreet's claim to fame was not as an icon of the cultural scene. Yet, he was well known for a different set of reasons, and much beloved among the people he worked with. He first shot into public life when he received the national RTI council award in 2011 on behalf of the National Alliance for People's Movement (NAPM) which had used the Right to Information Act to expose fraud and misappropriation of public assets. NAPM used the RTI Act to investigate Adarsh, the tower meant for Kargil war widows, but usurped by bureaucrats, politicians and defence personnel who had no role to play in Kargil.

Trained as an engineer, Simpreet combined RTI and legal action with ground-level organisational work among the slum dwellers who faced and fought demolition of their homes, as land intended for public use (including slum re-settlement) was diverted blatantly for commercial and high-end residential uses.

According to press interviews given by Simpreet, his attention was first drawn to this issue six years ago, when the government of Maharashtra declared that they would turn Mumbai into Shanghai, and began to dole out land reserved for the poor and homeless to developers. Since adequate information on these matters was not available freely in the public domain, the group of activists around Simpreet began to use the RTI to get information on original land use, diversions, and other related matters.

It was in the course of this work that they came upon several housing frauds related to the slum rehabilitation scheme where land meant to house slum dwellers was grabbed by builders with political consent. They found out that construction of a building had begun at the Backbay Reclamation in Colaba where many defence personnel and bureaucrats were members. For this project, coastal regulations, floor space index ratings and environmental clearances had been manipulated. The file notings also showed in chronological order how each minister and bureaucrat who got a flat in Adarsh was involved at some point or other in granting permits such as commencement and occupation certificates. The final list of 103 members showed that there were hardly any Kargil widows even among defence personnel who got flats.

The activist similarly exposed the environment violations committed by the Lavasa group while constructing luxury apartments in Pune. They also exposed other land scams in Mumbai, including the ‘Ocean of Justice', a housing complex for High Court judges built on land meant for the homeless. Simpreet could have rested on the media accolades he received for his work, but he went on to organise the resistance of the slum dwellers to eviction and resettlement for the benefit of high-end developers.

Simpreet's work as a grassroots organiser was recently documented on Al Jazeera TV, where an episode directed by Faiza Khan showed him organising the residents of Ambujawadi slum in northwest Mumbai, who had been served notices of eviction by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation to make way for luxury apartments. Along with the slum dwellers, Simpreet and the NAPM's Ghar Bachao Ghar Banao Andolan had embarked on a different sort of documentation—of the marshy land being filled and made fit for habitation by the slum dwellers over a period of 16 to 17 years, of homes and lives painstakingly built, and of records of continuous stay.

In our fractured society, it is people like Simpreet who keep our aspirations of social justice alive. We wish him a speedy recovery.
..Source