One in two Mumbaikars lives in a slum

Despite incomes far above the national average, few can afford a non-shanty home

Mumbai: The contrast of wealth and poverty in the life of the city could hardly be starker. Although the average Mumbaikar’s income is more than twice the national average, one in two people in the city lives in a slum.
    “As per 2006-07 pricing, the per capita net income of a Mumbaikar is Rs 65,361—one and a half times Maharashtra’s average of Rs 41,331, and twice the country’s average of Rs 29,328,’’ states the 2009 UNDP Human Development Report (HDR) on Mumbai.
    Mumbai thus fares worse than the global average of one in three persons living in slums. It’s worse off than other Indian metros, too. The HDR gives the percentages of residents in slums as 18.9 for Delhi, 11.72 for Kolkata, and 25.6 for Chennai. Even considering other estimates, which place those figures much higher at around 27%, 30% and 25% respectively, Mumbai is worse off, with 54.1% of its population living in slums. The fact that they together occupy just 6% of the city’s land indicates “horrific’’ levels of congestion, the report points out.
    Urban planner Chandrashekhar Prabhu attributes the contrast between the citizens’ improving incomes and shabby housing to the skewed distribution of funds for schemes that benefit slum residents. “More than sea links and flyovers, projects targeting 80% of commoners are needed,’’ he says. “The population density in even Bhuleshwar equals that in a slum, but slums face health and sanitation problems,’’ says Prabhu.
Two-thirds of the city
can’t afford a non-slum home due to the acute shortage of affordable housing. The report says that Greater Mumbai (the BMC area from Colaba to Dahisar, Mulund and Mankhurd)
constitutes about 10% of the total geographic area but accounts for 63% of the population of the Mumbai metropolitan region. Population density in the city has leapt from 27,000 persons per square km in 2001 to about 48,000 now, contributing to the growth of slums.
The report states that City Mayors, an international think-tank, has ranked Mumbai as the world’s densest city. The report cites migration as the prime reason for this. Mumbai’s real per capita income (income adjusted for inflation) rose 42% from Rs 36,501 in 1993-94 to Rs 51,938 in 2005-06, while that of the state rose 61% from Rs 18,909 to Rs 29,085 in the same period. “Although the income rise in Mumbai is less than in the state, Mumbai’s per capita income is almost double that of the state,’’ says the report. Even so nearly 40% of Mumbaikars report an average monthly household income of Rs 2,978.