Delhi Slum Demolitions Displace Hundreds, Spark Political Row and Resident Concerns

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Delhi Slum Demolitions Displace Hundreds, Spark Political Row and Resident Concerns

Over 1,200 illegal shanties were demolished, impacting primarily daily labourers who claimed long-term residency in the area.

RMN News Delhi Desk
June 12, 2025

New Delhi – Hundreds of people have been displaced in south Delhi’s Kalkaji after the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) razed illegal structures at Bhoomihin Camp jhuggi and Govindpuri jhuggi cluster, acting on instructions from the Delhi High Court. Over 1,200 illegal shanties were demolished, impacting primarily daily labourers who claimed long-term residency in the area.

While 1,862 economically weak families have been provided flats as part of an in-situ rehabilitation project in Kalkaji Extension, approximately 1,200 families without ration cards are not eligible for rehabilitation. Slum-dwellers reported receiving an eviction notice from the DDA only three days in advance.

The demolition drive has ignited a political firestorm. Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Atishi, whose constituency is Kalkaji, has condemned it as an “anti-poor policy,” alleging that the BJP’s DDA initiated the court order and opposed the poor in court. She claimed people were “forced out of their homes, beaten with sticks”. The BJP had previously promised concrete houses to the urban poor living in slums ahead of the Delhi election.

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Conversely, BJP leader and Delhi minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa defended the DDA’s actions to clear encroachments, accusing the AAP of “spreading lies and misleading people”. Sirsa stated that those whose slums were removed had been given separate houses and questioned the AAP’s record on providing housing, invoking Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “jahan jhuggi wahi makaan” (a house where the slum is) slogan, referring to in-situ rehabilitation.

The demolitions are viewed as a “multifaceted issue” by Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs) of nearby DDA colonies such as Konark, Kohinoor, Gomti, and Everest apartments. These residents have frequently complained that their access roads are blocked by encroachments and have raised concerns over a rise in unruly e-rickshaw menace and snatching incidents as the jhuggi expanded. Residents also alleged that Atishi, during her election campaign, promised to solve these issues but did nothing after winning.

Meanwhile, a few days ago, Left parties and activists gathered at Jantar Mantar to protest against what they described as “forced” demolition and eviction drives, which they associate with a recent “cleanliness” drive launched by Chief Minister Rekha Gupta.

Protesters assert that the drive follows a familiar pattern: promises of a “green and aesthetically pleasing city” leading to a crackdown on “so-called encroachments” and a “selective demolition campaign targeting the capital’s most vulnerable”.