NEW DELHI: Thirty-year-old Mohammad Sarfaraz’s disability certificate describes him as suffering from dwarfism and paralysis. His ragpicker mother shows his Aadhaar card as she begs anyone she meets for assistance. Both were rendered homeless on Wednesday when Delhi Development Authority demolished a cluster of 100 hutments near Shastri Park Metro station on grounds of encroachment on Yamuna basin.

The frantic display of documents then had been of no help. The exercise rendered 900 people including more than 200 children homeless. The group had been on tenterhooks ever since Delhi Development Authority officials came to warn them verbally to pack up or be evicted on Monday. No official notice was issued but DDA officials were clear that this was not required of them in case of encroachments.

However, the big question is why this settlement was allowed to come up in the first place and why DDA had failed to secure the land. The demolition of homes at this stage has only added to the homeless count in the capital leaving the families of these poor daily wagers struggling even harder for survival.

After the bulldozers left, the men, women and children tried to salvage what little was left of their belongings. In one corner, social workers from NGO Humana People to People, who run an informal school for the children, were seen carrying out a rapid survey of those displaced. The kids wondered if they will be able to return to school while angry men and women came rushing with ration cards, gas connection papers, voter IDs and other documents prepared with the address which had now ceased to exist after the demolitions. Some claimed they had been here since the 1990s.

Mohd Jamal, who is pradhan of the community, said he met lieutenant governor Najeeb Jung after the demolition and apprised him of their ordeal. “He will do something for our welfare,” Jamal told TOI. However, there was no confirmation of the impromptu meeting from Raj Nivas. The settlement faced demolitions even last December.

DDA officials claim to have gone by the rulebook and had labelled the settlement an encroachment falling in Zone O of Master Plan 2021. Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board officials, who visited the site on Tuesday, had returned to report that the cluster is a temporary settlement occupied by a floating population and does not figure on the list of 690 identified JJ clusters under its purview. At the moment, there is no relocation and rehabilitation policy for clusters such as this one.

