This paper attempts to bring out the endangered conditions of the erstwhile mill workers and

other migrant workers who live in the working class chawls and slums in the textile mill areas
of Mumbai-their everyday struggles with housing and resilience to the threat of
gentrification.

The contemporary space of the mill lands of Mumbai the Girangoan area appears like a
historical collage. The process of deindustrialisation in Mumbai city which led to the eventual
closure of the textile mills from 1980 onwards coincided with the emergence of a new
landscape. Remnants of a number of old mill gates that were once the site of many textile
mill movements are standing in a forlorn fashion along with their cold functionless chimneys
jutting up in the sky. The rugged brick and stone buildings, typical chawl residences of the
working class people standing along with the tall residential high-rises and corporate offices
with modern architecture portrays a city space of juxtaposition. What was initially mill land
has transformed into a space of plurality and contrast. There is a spiralling up of the land
value at an astronomical rate. The upper class outsiders who are moving in are needed to pay
exorbitant rents or huge amounts to buy flats. In comparison the original inhabitants pay
either nominal rent or no rent given the existing rules of the Rent Control Act. Furthermore
by claiming ownership to their one room tenements, the residents of these chawls are able to
bargain for high rates of compensation from builders so as to facilitate their movement into
more comfortable housing in the suburbs. Therefore different classes of people are brought
together in the same arena without complete displacement of one by the other. The
redevelopment processes have not remained restricted to the mill lands but entered the
residential areas also through the redevelopment of working class chawls. The increasing
market rent of the one room tenement in slums, chawls or in other apartments brings out the
crucial role played by the real estate and builders in the city. The increasing housing crisis in
the city space, the rising slums within the city made the conditions of the marginalised more
vulnerable. This paper through an ethnographic study with semi structured interviews and
observations attempts to bring out the everyday life struggle of the marginalised with housing
crisis and space and their ways of negotiating it.