Why were the slum dwellers in Delhi not extended the same leeway and time to vacate by municipal authorities as they were in Mumbai? A DDA official speaking to Newslaundry said encroachments such as the slum in question need not be given prior notice. “They have only settled there in the last year or so, so we don’t need to notify them. But I believe they were intimated a day or two before on humanitarian grounds”, she said. There are also no rehabilitation schemes for settlements like this slum, as it does not figure on the list of 690 identified JJ clusters under the DDA’s purview. Which essentially means the slum and its inhabitants don’t even officially exist.