New Delhi CNN –
The bulldozers and government officials arrived just before dawn and tore down the row of shacks as confused residents nearby looked on inconsolably.
“We were so scared,” said 56-year-old Jayanti Devi as she tried to save what was left of her belongings in the heart of New Delhi. “They destroyed everything. We have nothing left.”
For the past 30 years, their house has stood on a dilapidated sidewalk, next to an open sewer, opposite the sprawling Pragati Maidan complex, a prominent convention center in the Indian capital that is hosting Group of 20 (G20) leaders this week will be a guest. Nations.
But the apartment is not what US President Joe Biden, France’s Emmanuel Macron or British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will see when they arrive for the crucial summit.
Devi is among tens of thousands of New Delhi’s most marginalized residents evicted from their homes ahead of the G20 meeting, as authorities begin a mass demolition operation in neighborhoods across the city.
The government justified the demolitions by saying the buildings were “illegal” and said it intended to relocate some of the affected communities to new housing.
But activists questioned the timing, claiming instead that the demolitions were part of a “beautification” project – a campaign to rid the city of its beggars and slums – to impress foreign dignitaries.
The image of India that Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to project at the G20 summit is that of a modern superpower, a leader of the Global South and a voice for impoverished nations. But the government is accused of hiding one of the country’s most profound and lasting problems.
“What strikes me most is that India, the Indian state, is ashamed of the supposed poverty,” said Harsh Mander, a social activist who works with homeless families and street children. “She doesn’t want the poverty to be visible to the people who come here.”
In a written response in Parliament in July, the Indian government denied any connection between the house demolitions and the G20 summit.
CNN has reached out to New Delhi and the federal government but has not yet received a response.
Delhi has long been a city of glaring inequalities.
It is a city where millionaires live in gleaming mansions next to homeless families on nearby footpaths and where children sell toys to passengers in cars stopped at traffic lights. It is a city that attracts huge business numbers, but the demand for jobs is ever increasing.
According to the government’s last census in 2011, around 16 million people live in the capital, but only 23.7% of them live in “planned” or “approved” neighborhoods, according to a report by the New Delhi-based think tank Center for policy research.
The rest live in designated slums, villages and unauthorized neighborhoods.
In April, Savita and her four daughters watched in despair as government authorities drove into their settlement – an unauthorized neighborhood – next to the 14th-century Tughlaqabad Fort, a Delhi landmark, demolished their small home, leaving seven years of memories in ruins put ashes.
“I can’t explain how distraught everyone was when they razed the houses,” Savita said. “People were screaming, crying and begging them to stop.”
The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), which carried out the demolitions, claims Savita and her neighbors encroached on the land and built their homes illegally, according to court documents seen by CNN. In a notice to residents in January, the ASI ordered all “encroachers” to “remove illegal structures at their own expense within a period of 15 days,” according to court documents.
The ASI did not respond to requests for comment.
Savita said she knew that her family bought land in an unauthorized colony when she was building her house in 2016.
“We knew what risk we were taking. But we are poor and this is all we can afford,” she said. “People have lived here for over 40 years. Why didn’t the authorities demolish these houses sooner? Why now?”
Homeless and hungry
More than 100,000 residents of the Tughlaqabad area lost their homes in April, according to a Supreme Court petition filed by a lawyer supporting the residents.
With nowhere to go and no money to rent an apartment, many, including Savita’s family, had no choice but to live under tarpaulins on the rugged land, even as torrential rains and floods ravaged the city.
During the day, they begged nearby police officers for some bread to share between the six of them. One night she said: Men tried to kidnap their neighbor’s daughter and dragged the screaming teenager into the dark forest.
“We endured these hardships for six weeks,” Savita said through tears. Her daughters were forced to study next to piles of trash while stray dogs and cows rummaged through rotting food. Her daughters had difficulty with their schoolwork and became depressed and withdrawn.
This is not the first time that an Indian government has carried out slum or barrack demolitions ahead of a major international event.
In 2010, when the now opposition The Indian National Congress was in power, beggars were forced off the streets of New Delhi and slums were destroyed in the run-up to the Commonwealth Games, upending the lives of tens of thousands in the capital.
Mander, the social activist, said it was unfair for the government to target poor families because they lived on unauthorized land.
“The government does not recognize that illegality has been imposed on these poor people,” Mander said. “That’s because this city was planned so that there is no place for them to live legally. The destruction is being carried out with the utmost cruelty.”
The Delhi government has announced that it wants to rehabilitate Savita and her family. However, she says no help has arrived so far and is fighting her case in court. Her family is currently living temporarily with a relative in a two-room apartment in an overcrowded and cramped shanty town.
The stench of cow dung envelopes the ravines, where thousands of flies swarm outside the doors and mangy cats roam the alleys.
“My children don’t like it here,” Savita said. “You ask me why this is happening to us. What can I tell them?”
Since assuming the presidency of the G20 this year, India, the world’s new most populous country with 1.4 billion people, has emerged as a leader among emerging and developing economies at a time when consumers are under pressure. often referred to as the “Global South” – positioned by rising food and energy prices as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Modi sees India as a confident and modern superpower, the voice of the voiceless taking over the 21st century. Last month, India celebrated successfully completing a soft lunar landing, becoming only the fourth country in the world to achieve such a feat.
In a speech to Congress during a high-profile trip to the United States in June, Modi said “giving a voice to the Global South is the way forward.”
As the war continues to wreak havoc on the global economy, India has signaled its intention to address the many concerns of the global South, including the challenges of climate change and food and energy security.
“The world looks to the G20 to address challenges in growth, development, economic resilience, disaster resilience, financial stability, transnational crime, corruption, terrorism, and food and energy security,” Modi said in February.
But activists point out the irony of this image when India’s poorest are struggling at home.
“In the cold winter, people die on the streets and we destroy houses,” said Mander. “There must be a fundamental right to life… to live with dignity.”
Standing amid the rubble of her seven-year-old home, Savita said she had so many dreams for her family.
“I wanted my children to grow up here. I wanted to give them a stable upbringing,” she said.
Security forces are now patrolling the Tughlaqabad area as construction workers build a wall to seal off the country. “Where were you the day bulldozers took over our house?” the residents angrily asked the guards. “Why didn’t you come to help us?”
Devi from Pragati Maidan area is now forced to live in a makeshift tent on a nearby pavement with no respite from the scorching summer heat.
She says no one helped her find alternative accommodation.
She sells tea and snacks to make ends meet, surrounded by rotting garbage and an open sewer that attracts hundreds of mosquitoes and flies. She feels defeated and alone.
“We are so angry, but our poverty makes us powerless,” Devi said. “We can’t speak up.”