Introduction
Slums, the silhouette of urbanisation have not been a part of mainstream discourses since its conceptual inception. Over the years, the “socio-political thought leaders” have divided urbanism and urbanisation into two distinct baskets. Urbanisation, on the one end is the movement of people from rural to urban settlements and the expansion of the urban area. On the other hand, urbanism is the way of life in an urbanised settlement, and it is characterised by superficial or impersonal social interactions, individualism, and anonymity like traits. Urbanism has led to new social issues in the urban areas such as ghettoisation, i.e., isolation and marginalisation of a particular demographic group due to various socioeconomic, cultural, and political factors.
India, for its pompous bugle of “Unity in Diversity” has failed to build a safer and inclusive society, especially for its slum-dwelling population. As per a report by Asha India foundation, populous cities such as Delhi boasts more than one crore population as per the 2011 census and out of which, close to 20 lacs population lives in the urban slums. In 2024, those numbers must have doubled or tripled due to migration of population from various parts of India as well as the illegals from our neighbouring countries, especially post Covid-19 pandemic. Urban slums, usually characterised by their distinct location on illegally occupied public lands and road boast lack of proper education, sanitation, and other basic services. These areas are often scoffed at by the policymakers have become a hotbed for acute poverty, violence, and juvenile delinquency, especially the sexual abuse of slum children. Among all the man-made disasters, the exploitation of children remains the Achilles’ heel for the society to deal with. This shows the systematic neglect, broader structural problems, and lack of empathy for this marginalised section of the society. Addressing this disaster requires paradigm shift in the right direction as a society to be more inclusive and empathetic towards the vulnerable population.
The manifestation of patriarchy in such cases normalises aggression in the slum-dwelling families due to lack of employment, education, and productive recreational avenues in the urban slums. Delhi, the capital city has been the unfortunate front runner as the epicentre for criminal activities in the slum areas. A few years back, it topped the world chart as the most unsafe city in the world beating many conflict-prone areas of Africa and notorious cities like Shanghai and Bangkok. Child marriages and child prostitution like heinous social malice are on the hike in the capital city. As per the NCRB report 2022, Delhi boasts a staggering 14,247 cases against women with a humongous crime rate of 144.4 against the national average of 66.4. The same report shows a sorry state of Juvenile involvement in 2,436 cases out of 14,247 cases that includes rape, kidnapping, and outraging the modesty of women like offences.
Understanding the Factors Behind the Rise of Juvenile Crime Rates in Delhi Slums
Social Factors:
The alarming increase in juvenile offences around urban slums in Delhi is a multifaceted problem. From a sociology standpoint, unstable institutions such as family and community, delinquent peers, and the banality of violence have been some of the major contributors. Juvenile crimes are socially deviant behaviours of slum-dwelling children due to lack of parental guidance during their formative years. Exposure to domestic abuse and maltreatment often push these children to seek advice from their peers, who more often lead an analogous way of life. Patriarchal norms and societal acceptance of aggression coupled with lack of knowledge about children’s rights are a vicious combination for increasing sexual violence in urban slums. Irrespective of being the national capital, Delhi boasts an alarmingly low literacy rate and high dropout rate of 56% and 29% respectively in the primary education for its slum-dwelling students. The local government’s proclamation of high-quality educational opportunities seems like an exclusionary policy at work after analysing these rates.
Economic Factors:
The inability of the slum-dwelling families to fulfil basic requirements for the children to lead a dignified life in a society often results in juvenile delinquency. Poverty and unemployment lead to economic stagnation and deprivation among the slum communities. As per a recent report by Frontline, many slum children in Delhi are a part of exploitative begging networks and drug peddling like activities to provide financial support for their families. Such dangerous employment avenues often foster criminal mindset among these children to get recognition and earn more money in the process. The stark inequality between the affluent and the slum-dwelling children in many instances lead to alienation and insecurity among the latter. This insecurity translates to resentment and very often leads to criminal activities such as kidnapping and rapes by the slum children. Lack of economic freedom also impacts marriage like institutions that marginalises the already subjugated girl children in the slums. Child marriages are quite common in the urban slums of Delhi and over the years there have been many instances where the child rights groups and law enforcement agencies had to intervene to protect children.
Political Factors
Political-will plays a leading role in alleviating a vulnerable stratum of any society. Yet, just as the policy professionals, politicians also neglect slums from the mainstream development processes. This systematic negligence reflects in poor service delivery, lack of basic amenities, and safety for the children. The southeastern Delhi slums, as per Delhi’s lieutenant governor VK Saxena, lacks access to basic infrastructure, amenities and living under pitiable conditions. Politicisation of slums to gain electoral advantage in the election has been a routine practice for many political leaders. Political leaders often take advantage of the delinquent groups in these slums to proxy their dirty works. Failure to accommodate slums in policy, mudslinging attitudes of political parties, and weak law enforcement systems create a conducive environment for juvenile offenders to commit crimes, especially sexual abuses of children in slums.
Unwinding of the Nexus between Geography, Demography, and Patriarchy in Delhi Slums
Geography
As the national capital, Delhi acts as a strategic magnet to attract lakhs of migrants from across India. As an economic and cultural hub, it shelters the refugees from neighbouring countries who were subjected to violence by their native governments. Yet, there exists a significant level of gap between the migration rate and the needed infrastructure development to cater the growing population. Hence, the inadequate living spaces to accommodate all the migrants from the low-income families resulted in the subsequent proliferation of the informal urban settlements, i.e., slums in the peripheral regions of Delhi. The lack of security and weak enforcement of laws in these slums foster a conducive environment for crime and exploitation. The slum children living in these cramped spaces often find themselves as the victims of abuse and especially sexual violence due to inadequate safety measures for them.
Demography
Demography of the Delhi slums constitutes a highly disproportionate number of adults and children. As per a report by Asha India Foundation, these sections of the population grow up in a dilapidated environment and many of whom also lose their life due to poor sanitation and lack of access to basic services like healthcare and nutrition. The demographic imbalance coupled with high population density around the urban slum in Delhi forces children towards criminal activities, substance abuse, and sexual violence from their formative years. These children are negatively included in the market due to lack of regulation and guidance. Inadequate state policies combined with lack of role models to look up to to protect these children lead to their exploitation by their own peers and the unemployment adults in the slums. The toxic manifestation of masculinity and the role that patriarchal culture plays in this regard cannot be ignored while assessing the lives of these young minds.
Patriarchy
Patriarchy and its impacts in Delhi are no different from the rest of the country, i.e., marginalisation and subjugation of women. Patriarchy undervalues the rights of women and children to maintain the prevalent power equation in a society. In urban slums, coupled with lack of access to education, nutrition, and employment makes the lives of the women and especially the children worse. As a result, children especially girls are increasingly vulnerable to sexual violence like crimes. As per a study by Tonmoy Islam, the normalisation of aggression and violence, lack of sex education to make children aware of their rights, and the fear of shame and stigma like factors are associated with increasing juvenile sexual violence in the urban slums of Delhi. Patriarchy boldens the perpetrator by giving them conducive environment and on the other hand make roadblocks for the community empowerment to challenge such incidents. Hence, to understand the holistic picture of increasing juvenile crimes in urban slums, one needs to understand the nexus between geography, demography, and patriarchy like powers at play.
Also read: Abused but forgotten: The Untold Plight of Men in Honor Crimes
Policies: Inefficient or Inadequate?
Juvenile crimes, including the sexual abuse of children urban slums are a complex socioeconomic and cultural problem that need a mixed multisectoral and multistakeholder policy making approach. Article 23 of the Indian Constitution explicitly prohibits forced labour and trafficking of children, yet the enforcement of the same remain questionable when it comes to slum children. The inefficiencies and lack of inclusive policy frameworks to accommodate slum-dwelling families accentuate the prevalent implementation and coverage gaps of those state-led and national policies.
National Urban Livelihood Mission (NULM) is a flagship initiative by the government of India to address the stagnant economy of the urban slums. It aims to provide relief to low-income families in the urban areas through sustainable skill development programs and employment opportunities. However, coverage of urban slums has been historically low under this scheme. This scheme primarily focuses on the economic growth without considering the importance of education and childcare. Juvenile crimes are a manifestation of inadequate access to education and employment opportunities, yet the scheme in question does not provide any meaningful measures to address this urban slum crisis.
As per the 2023-24 economic survey of Delhi government, it had a vision to provide sustainable and inclusive housing solutions and rehabilitation for the urban slums. The growing population demands adequate housing infrastructure, yet the promise to provide so has largely fallen short. Similarly, Mission Buniyaad, the flagship initiative by the Delhi government to bridge the educational gaps in the lower- and middle-income families only focuses on those who are school-going. The scheme does nothing for the dropout rate and the loss of educational years for the slum children. As a result, a significant percentage of these dropout numbers are added to the juvenile delinquent population in the urban slums of Delhi.
Another flagship scheme was launched by the government of India, i.e., Integrated Child Protection Scheme (ICPS) to protect the vulnerable children from violence, abuse, and neglect from their families and the environment they grow up in. However, as per a study by Jitendra Kumar Meena, the mean coverage of ICPS remains only a modest 58.3% for the children in Delhi’s urban Slums. Hence, the scope and reach of this scheme remains limited and resource constraint is a major roadblock to its implementation. Conceptually, the ICPS remains the only scheme with real potential to bring about significant improvements, yet fragmented implementation and bureaucratic hurdles are still significant roadblocks to effective execution of the scheme for the children in the Delhi slums.
While policy gaps are widening at an alarming rate, there is a need for revision of the existing framework and the definition of urbanisation and urban development in the context of urban slums. Political willingness and commitment to empower community safety measures should come to the fore of the priority list to protect these vulnerable children in the urban slums from juvenile crimes, especially sexual violence.
The Long Road Ahead
In the end, it is the prerogative of the whole society to safeguard the vulnerable children from urban slums. Delhi is not the only city marred by this man-made disaster of child exploitation. Populous metropolitan cities like Kolkata, Mumbai, Hyderabad, and Pune also suffers from the same notoriety. Juvenile sexual abuse highlights the existing structural inequalities present in the urban poverty, systemic negligence, and toxic manifestation of patriarchy. Addressing this complex and multifaceted issue requires the amalgamation of inclusive policy making, empathetic action, institutional change, and community development.
Inclusive Policy Making
Addressing juvenile crimes requires an inclusive approach by integrating policies like ‘Beti Bachao Beti Padhao’ with legal safeguards like the Juvenile Justice Act to protect children in the urban slums from sexual exploitation. Expansion of scope for these policies to accommodate the slum areas is the need of the hour. Delhi could take a leaf out of Brazil’s Bolsa Família scheme to improve dropout rates at schools from middle and low-income families. The concerned policy includes a conditional cash transfer to mothers’ bank accounts to keep the students in school. Such a novo idea can be taken up by the local governments of cities with high population and slum density to assess its impacts both on the slum children and their families.
Empathy is Essential
Empathy plays a pivotal role to bridge the envy and resentment gap that exists between the slum-dwelling children and their more affluent counterparts. Empathy underlines the importance battling juvenile crimes and especially gendered sexual exploitation of children in the urban slums. Asha Foundation and Save the Children like NGOs and other civil society organisations (CSOs) are working tirelessly in tandem to protect the rights and dignity of the slum-dwelling children. Regular meetings with the slum community and the residing families to improve their socioeconomic conditions and improve the stability of the family structure could potentially help curb the galloping trends in the juvenile sexual offences.
Institutional Reforms
The role of Institutions in such matters remains of paramount significance to bring about a positive paradigm shift. Institutions optimises policy outcomes by reducing transaction cost by fostering coordination between different stakeholders. In Delhi, the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) is working in tandem with local ULBs to monitor child abuse cases and protect children in the slums from juvenile sexual abuse. However, in this case, the role of institutions is diluted due to poor coordination, inefficient planning, and negligence for the slum-dwelling population. A more realistic and comprehensive framework integrated with a multistakeholder approach would ensure effective implementation of government policies in the Delhi slums.
Community Initiatives
Champions of Change can foster true and long-term change by transforming the lives of slum children. Bachpan Bachao Andolan (Save Childhood Movement) by Kailash Satyarthi that has saved more than eighty thousand slum children from malnutrition and exploitation exemplifies the power of grassroots advocacy to drive sustainable social change. Individuals and organisations should come forward to advocate for child protection and the survivors from the slums should take a stand against the juvenile offenders to be role models for the community.
About the author …
This blog is written by Tarun Kumar, a Masters candidate at Tata Institute of Social Science (TISS), Hyderabad.
