In Mumbai village, fight for land amid promise of ‘development’

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Sahar lies in the Andheri suburb of Mumbai and is one of the gaothans — original settlements of the East Indians on Salsette Island. Today, no part of it resembles a village. According to Shashikant Shirke — who has lived in the village for the past 48 years — until 1979, this area was completely rural.

“It had no connectivity to the city. I used to walk all the way from here to Chakala,” he says.

Today it is bustling with vehicles, has rows of colourful shops and stalls and a mixed population including Bengalis, Keralaites, Marwaris, UP-ites and Maharashtrians.

In the 1980s, the Sahar International Airport (now Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport) came up on the lands of the village’s original settlers.

In 2006, the operation of the airport was leased out to the Mumbai International Airport Limited.

The residents of the village say this transfer led to positive changes for the airport, but since then, they have had a fraught relationship with the authorities, living with the fear that their land would be taken away for development projects.

The luminescent airport and nests of luxury like the ITC Maratha, Hyatt Residency and the Lalit are a stone’s throw from Sahar.

The village’s precarious position in the midst of frenetic modernisation is apparent with grey half-built concrete structures looming over its lines of shops.

“Development is fine, none of us opposes it. But we have a fine convent school, good colleges around us, a large number of people work nearby at the airport, cargo companies and hotels. Twenty per cent of the residents are daily-wage labourers. The price of being displaced will be steep for all of us, managers and labourers alike,” says Shirke.

Earlier this year in September, many Sahar residents refused to cooperate with the MMRDA, which was carrying out a survey to determine how many of those occupying the ‘encroached’ territory were eligible for rehabilitation.

“All the villagers and all the political parties, such as the Congress, Shiv Sena and RPI, came together to oppose our displacement,” says Gopi, “except the BJP because they’re in the seat of power.”

This original village has an uncertain and shifting identity, but its residents continue to stay positive with the wide support that their demands are receiving.

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