Rehabilitation is to rebuild the homes, reunite the community, and re-render the living standards and habits.The universal
definition of a slum is a heavily populated urban area characterized by substandard housing and filth. Slums lack water, no sewage or solid waste facilities, pollution, and shelter shortages, ventilation problems, nonetheless they establish homes on unused land that is usually privately owned or
government owned. The major reason for the growth of slums is migration in search of employment from villages to metropolis. The consequence is a more crowded metropolis where lack of employment, food and shelter is worsened by heavy expenditure. Slums are a global problem, Over 300 million urban poor in the developing countries live in squalid, unsafe environments. UN Habitat predicts that by 2030, one in every three people in the world could be living in a slum. Let’s wake up to the crisis that our generation XYZ will face, and make a move today before it’s too late for changes to be implemented. This article will concentrate on slums in Mumbai. Mumbai, the city of dreams, is India’s financial capital, but behind the glamour and hype, is a different reality – a city landscape distinct by its massive, sprawling slums –one of the biggest in the world. Metropolitan Mumbai has about 7.5 million slums. Indeed, about 60 percent of Mumbai's population lives in an estimated 37,000 slums. These are not just figures that are just to be quoted in discussions, articles and thesis. This is reality of 7.5 million living people. It is time for a crucial move,
Rehabilitation - or slum improvement as it is also called – is the provision of basic services, But fundamental is social and moral training programs to improve the well-being of the community. As the government realizes the situation, projects of MUTP under MMRDA come into the picture. The transport problems of Mumbai are aggravated by the exiting slums, sprawling over the roads. Managing the rehabilitation of this large number of slum residents and commercial block in slums therefore becomes a critical part of most transport projects. The project today comprises of the following three plans: (i) the rail transport - to capacity optimization and enhancement of railway system (ii) road transport - development of Traffic Management, road widening and (iii) slum Rehabilitation. A total of 19,228 project affected households
exist and are required to be re-settled according to the project plan. 50% of the PAHs were resettled in June 2001 and Over 38% were resettled in January 2004. Though a few sites still have the road widening project going on and the R&R is still under process, we see major chunk of it as developed already. This abstract aimed at causing awareness of the large scale development project for slums, being carried out in Mumbai. I have personally visited the slums at Jogeshwari in 2004, and the rehabilitated colony of the same slum dwellers in 2006 for my projects. My interviews with the residents there were very enlightening. They bring to light a lot of positive work done by the government and the social organizations like NGOs and SRA. Not that it’s the ultimate and things are perfect, but it’s a good move towards development. Anyone interested in the interviews of the slum dwellers. Contact at – critic_arch@yahoo.com