Mumbai: High on hopes, BDD chawl residents take a walk down memory lane

Pushpatai Chavan, 74, moved to BDD chawl after marriage, almost half a century ago. She currently stays in a 160-sq ft room with her son and his family. Nothing much has changed in the house since, except she has stopped cooking on a clay choolah (stove), and the ceiling and walls that had turned dark from smoke, now have a fresh layer of paint. She is eagerly awaiting the 2-BHK flat she will get after the redevelopment work is complete.

Last week, MHADA, the nodal agency for the redevelopment of the chawls, finally assigned the redevelopment contract to Tata Capacite. Shapoorji Pallonji will be redeveloping the NM Joshi Marg BDD chawls, Larsen & Toubro will be redeveloping the ones in Naigaon.

Pushpatai recollects the gradual transformation the chawls underwent. For example, when she moved here, there used to be only one electric socket. "Most evenings, we took recourse to kerosene lamps. Any delay in bill payment resulted in line disconnection, and the salaries of the residents being low, this would often be the case. We would end up staying in the dark, relying on the little light the lamp provided," she said.

Looking at the ceiling of her house, she recounted how everything in the house had turned black because she used to cook food on a clay stove. "Altercations were a common affair, mostly over water. There was a community tap and water timings were fixed. Some women would sit washing their clothes at the tap. This would enrage the others, and in a fit of rage, they would splash water at them," she said.

BDD chawls once housed mostly mill workers. However, with the closure of the mills, today's generation has taken up to other kinds of work; one can hardly find an active mill worker residing there.

For example, Rahul Inarkar, who works with a multi-national company, resides at the BDD chawl in Lower Parel. He says, "Who doesn't want redevelopment? Even I want it. It is a good thing that there's finally some progress. But, we want more clarity on when the agreement with the tenants will be signed, when we will get the flats, etc."

Another BDD chawl resident, Ashok Kamble, 65, recollects how when he was born there were only three members in the house, but now seven people squeeze into the 160-sq ft room. "My family has been residing here for more than 70-years. I am happy that I will get to move to a bigger flat," he said.

A visit to these chawls reveals the reality of the water crisis there. Most of the residents weren't ready to meet us between 4 pm and 6.30 pm. Reason? That is the when they get the water supply. For people like Dilip Rohekar, filling water is an important task and he cannot afford to waste that time talking to a reporter. "Between 4 to 6.30 pm we all are very busy. Look at any of the windows, you will find drums filled with water. We get water only during these two and half hours. We are hoping that this problem won't plague us at the bigger flats. Rohekar's father moved to BDD chawl in 1945.

According to Raju Chavan, another resident, third-generation residents, they got taps installed in their homes only in 1985. There are six common toilets on each floor, three for men and three for women.

There are long pipes piercing the walls exactly at the centre. "They have been there since the building was constructed; we didn't remove it. It was apparently meant for drying clothes."

While working on a college project on BDD chawls, Dhanashree Khavanekar, 25, who also is a resident of the chawls, learned about the history of the place. "These were meant to serve as prisons during the British era," she said. "The rooms didn't have doors or windows. If someone had to go outside, he/ she would have to ask his neighbour to keep an eye on the room," she said.