Dharavi Residents Clung On To Hope Amid COVID-19 Lockdown

Dharavi in Mumbai, one of the biggest slums in Asia, is also the city's biggest COVID-19 hotspot with some 190 cases and 12 deaths. It is now divided into five red zones and 37 containment areas.

This 2 sqkm congested area with tiny homes has a population of some seven lakh. Most of them are daily wagers, migrant workers and small scale industry skilled labourers. Life has never been tougher for them.

Those in the red zones cannot step out even for essentials goods and services. There's an eerie silence in these otherwise crowded lanes. Everything has fallen silent. According to some estimates, the shops and factories here are the hub of an informal economy worth almost a billion dollars.

It has all shut down now as a precaution against the coronavirus.

"We are in difficulty. There is nothing to eat. Even our men are all sitting at home. Even if we step out, the police and the BMC (civic agency) are sending us in," says a resident in one of the containment zones.

In Dharavi, an average family of six lives in a small one-room home, so social distancing is a distant reality.

About 73 per cent of the population uses the 180 public toilets. People are complaining of not getting enough food.

They say the crisis will, however, bring the best out of people, so everyone is trying to help each other. They are contributing and giving food to the poor.

With COVID-19 cases rising everyday here, the state government has decided to administer hydroxychloroquine in some parts of Dharavi, but it will not be given to heart patients and people below 15 and above 60. This will benefit over a lakh of people, the authorities say.