gentrification

Gen·tri·fi·ca·tion

The process of neighbourhood change, usually resulting from an influx of relatively wealthy residents to a neighbourhood.

The phenomenon gets its word derived from the word “gentry” which historically refers to the people of an elevated social status.

When a city’s land is getting rapidly consumed, what seems to become an issue for the investing bodies is the scrasity of places for them to develop on. In this case, what begins is a hunt to identify the already occupied, poorly encroached precincts of the city. Under this lens, come the native regions habited by the gated communities struggling to cope up with the growing economy of the city.

Taking advantage of their supposedly substantial conditions when compared to the changed vicinities around, these urban pockets are declared mis-fit, at times even illegal. The bodies with dominant capital power intervene in their space and by convincing them to get better survival conditions, these communities are replaced and displaced either by choice or by force.

Gentrification, in this context, could be understood as a process where formerly deteriorated and depreciated urban neighbourhoods are identified and reoccupied by comparatively rich and supposedly sophisticated residents.

Bombay has been a witness to varied kinds of colonies, riots and communities sculpting the identity of the city at different points in time.

While some stayed as architectural ruins today, the others became a part of the people’s narratives, either ways Bombay has ages and layers of history that needs to be maintained as the city’s and its people’s heritage.

That said, for a city that contributes almost 50 per cent of the total revenue from metros of India in the case of income tax and excise duty , its growth and development stands inevitable and crucial too.

This highlights one of the reasons behind the influx of financially viable communities finding opportunities and a place to stay in Mumbai today.

But this isn’t the first time that the city has become a centre of financial and developmental growth opportunities.

Back then, with the establishment of the East India Company, Bombay then had been a witness to a huge haphazard influx of opportunists arriving from all corners of the country.

existing occupational settlements are bound to face difficulties to survive with this unplanned, sudden growth in the economic boom of the city.

In order to survive, they either have to diverge to other occupational options or succumb to the new ones trying to claim the city today.

It’s taken them years of determination to find a sense of familiarity in this city which was initially a mere place of work for them.

With the city now having a face shift, a second wave of massive development, the already

The case of the mills.

Apollo, Madhusudan, Bharat, and several other sizable cotton textile factories originally occupied the Sitaram Yadav Marg in Parel. In exchange for low rent, the migrants who worked here lived in chawls that were located close to the mills. The development of neoliberal policies and the mill owners’ greed for quick profits from the mills led to strikes by mill workers and an eventual closure in the 1990s, as Dwiparna Chatterjee noted in her paper on “Gentrification in the mill land areas of Mumbai City” presented at the International RC21 Conference 2013.

The employees were made to retire. The deindustrialization wave referred to the chawl settlements as outdated, decaying buildings.

The neighbourhood started to lose its industrial identity and transitioned into a post-industrial district. Wealthy arrivals in this area gave avarice to some of the legal tenants of the chawls to shift and let in the new for residency, while many fled the city without a choice and emigrated.

Unemployed mill employees, including widows, looked for domestic labour to continue to make ends meet in the city. This place, which was formerly a gated community, changed into a space of disputes as a result of the people choosing various survival strategies.

The case of the suburbs.

The exteriors of places like Dadar, Parel, and Matunga have been replaced by sky-touching structures on tiny, claustrophobic plots with glossy glass windows.

In the Dadar neighbourhood of Mumbai with pedestrian-friendly walkway, that once had ventilated balconies opening in has been replaced by intimidating concrete buildings

The Hindu Colony in Dadar has lost its distinctive local architectural character, as Fiona Fernandez accurately noted in her article for the Mid-day published on September 27, 2021.

Now that the balconies that originally faced the streets have vanished, all that is left to be seen are closed windows, deserted streets, and a lack of social interaction. The result has been the loss of local historicity, which authentically belongs to the city of Mumbai, and the weakening of social fabric as a result of suburban redevelopment based on global notions.

The case of the Tansa pipeline.

Thousands are being cleared out and relocated. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) evacuated thousands of impoverished residents living in slums along the Tansa pipeline to the outskirts of Mumbai for security and health grounds in order to make room for the migration of wealthier residents. Mahul, a former fishing community, is where these 30,000 displaced people are left to fend for themselves, according to Puja Changoiwala’s piece that appeared in The Guardian on February 26, 2018.

These families are pushed away from the city by the high concrete walls that house them. For the locals, necessities like electricity and water are luxury items. There are no nearby schools, colleges, offices, or transportation amenities.

These Mumbai residents were lured away with empty promises and are now left to fend for themselves in a province which lacks the supply of basic amenities and hygiene.

Gentrification, if thought about, could very well become a way of engaging a city and its people into new interactions where the already existing are celebrated and made to feel included by the new ones joining in as they find ways to boost the city’s economy together.

But unfortunately, what the city is facing today is the loss of its local heritage.

The natives are getting deeper in debt while trying to cope with the economic standards that would let them live where they live and feel a sense of belonging, a home away from home.

These natives of the city, are its living heritage and real identity. They are the contributors of its metropolitan status and stature today. Mills back then, commercial districts today, who knows what the future holds. But what stays constant are the workforce behind it.

It is the people who the city needs to not just keep going but to keep growing.

Hence, taking care of the ones who contributed at some potential time is the responsibility of the city. But a city like Mumbai, which was always planned to serve as a significant financial asset for the country, has a tendency to grow and become a land of opportunities for people.

But are we letting go of our very own in this process?

Many have become deprived of their homes to make homes for many others. Their necessities have transformed to become their challenges now. If not retrospected and redirected, the development of the city today, the chances of us being the next in line to be deprived of our right to have a corner of our own in the city can not be denied.