Each evening this winter, as MPs have debated India's political future, more than 100 people have been gathering at a municipal park behind the Bangla Sahib gurdwara.
The area has dozens of groups of protesters who arrive in the city each time Parliament is in session, to make their voices heard. The people in the park, though, aren't men and women with a cause: they are Delhi's homeless, evidence of the national capital's inability to address the needs of its most vulnerable -- and that, a 10-minute walk from the Parliament House.
Inside the park, there are two tents — one for men, with room for 80, and another for women and children, with space for 50. Only the luckiest get to make it inside, though; most are given a blanket, and sleep under the open sky.
Each night is much the same: at around 10.00 p.m., a harried Mohan Rathore, the caretaker of the men's shelter, struggles to make space within the tent for there is a steady stream of men thronging in. The youngsters volunteer to sleep outside, provided they are given blankets. Mr. Rathore notes down the name, age, father's name, id-proofs, and nativity of each inmate in a register.
Akram, from Tejpur in Assam, has arrived from Bangalore a few days back. Just 17 years old, he washes dishes at a dhaba nearby for a monthly salary of Rs.2,000. His incessant rambling and vacant eyes suggest he may have a problem with drugs. There isn't anyone around, though, to help with that problem. A blanket is the best he can hope for.
At the nearby women's shelter, caretaker Rajkumari Ekka has 24 women and 20 children to look after for the night. She still remembers with a chill running down her spine, the night of November 18, when a fire reduced the shelter to ashes and burnt to death nine-year-old Vijitha. The women at the shelter say they come to the tent every night because of the safety it accords them and nothing else. But the fire was an act of sabotage, they proclaim as one, and that the police sided with the culprits.
Vimla Devi, a 60-year-old hailing from Gwalior, made Delhi her home 10 years ago. She performs “sewa” at the Hanuman Mandir at Connaught Place. “To use the toilet, to drink water, and to get food we go to the Gurdwara Bangal Sahib. If the gurdwara was not there, we would all have been dead,” she says, as she opens her blanket to reveal a puppy (obviously, a pet dog of one of the VIPs residing nearby), sleeping soundly, that had strayed into the park grounds. The women and children have adopted him as one of their own now.
Nearby, a portacabin structure is being erected by Delhi municipal authorities. But several more of these structures will have to be set up if all the homeless in the area are to be sheltered. Fortunately, the park is big enough to cope with the flood of homeless people who will pour in, as the winter deepens.
This year, both the Supreme Court and the Delhi High Court have ordered authorities to make adequate arrangements for the homeless — but even if all of Delhi's shelters work to capacity, the demand is unlikely to be met. The national capital is estimated to have upwards of 88,000 people living on the streets, but its 64 permanent shelters and 84 temporary shelters can accommodate only 12,000 people.
So far this winter, just 16 temporary shelters and 42 of the permanent shelters have been functioning, serving some 2,000 people a day.
In some shelters, conditions are relatively good. The shelter at Regarpura near Karol Bagh has bunk-beds for all its 50 residents to sleep on, and food is provided four times a day. All the children in the shelter go to school. Afterwards, from 5 p.m. to 6.30 p.m they have private tuition, from 6.30 p.m. to 8 p.m. it is playtime when they indulge in running around and board-games like ludo. Dinner is served between 8 p.m. and 8.30 p.m. following which they get to watch television till 9.30 p.m. and lights are off by 10 p.m. Their mothers mostly work as domestic maids and have to be back at the “rahan basera” by 6 p.m. after which the gates are locked.
The shelter is run out of a three-storey community centre which hosted a few weddings every year and was the hub of anti-socials for the rest of the year. Initially, the women faced opposition and threats from the dissatisfied locals, but strong policing has helped them settle well into the community. A dispensary and a library function on the upper floors.
The women here, like 70-year-old Annapurna from West Bengal, 30-year-old Manju from Dabri, near Ghaziabad, and caretaker Aarti Kujur who earns Rs.7,000 for an eight-hour shift among the women, are happy residing in the shelter. Aarti says that people from even comparatively well-off families come by often seeking to “drop-off” elderly women here, because they have come to know this place is safe and the inmates are well-looked after.
“Ultimately, all temporary and permanent shelters should become like the permanent shelter at Regarpura which is almost a model to be followed,” says homeless-rights activist Bipin Rai.
Around the corner from the Parliament House, that vision seems like an impossible dream.
