Infrastructural Violence: Five Axes of Inequities in Water Supply in Delhi, India

Abstract

Inequity is deeply embedded in the supply of drinking water in Delhi, India. Using the concept of infrastructural violence, this paper exposes how past and present governance of water has resulted in unequal distribution of supply across the city to exclude vulnerable communities from accessing drinking water. This perspective broadens the gaze away from a narrow gaze on the technical and structural aspects of infrastructure to encompass the socio-political dimensions. This paper starts by outlining the history of the water supply in Delhi. We then outline five axes of exclusion which can be read as infrastructural violence and explores how aspects of water policy, legislation, and planning uphold these injustices. Our discussion centers on how economics, political ideology, and power infiltrate governing mechanisms to influence water infrastructure to entrench poverty and marginalization. Attempts to improve water security for Delhi's residents face minimal impact without addressing these embedded inequities. Therefore, our analysis offers a framework to systematically create awareness of the factors to be addressed to enable a more equitable governance of water supply.

Full text

ORIGINAL RESEARCH
published: 10 November 2021
doi: 10.3389/frwa.2021.727368
Frontiers in Water | www.frontiersin.org 1November 2021 | Volume 3 | Article 727368
Edited by:
Miguel R. Peña,
University of Valle, Colombia
Reviewed by:
Jamie Linton,
University of Limoges, France
Maurizio Mazzoleni,
Uppsala University, Sweden
*Correspondence:
Ashok Kumar
a.kumar@spa.ac.in
Specialty section:
This article was submitted to
Water and Human Systems,
a section of the journal
Frontiers in Water
Received: 18 June 2021
Accepted: 07 October 2021
Published: 10 November 2021
Citation:
Kumar A, Singh N, Cooper S, Mdee A
and Singhal S (2021) Infrastructural
Violence: Five Axes of Inequities in
Water Supply in Delhi, India.
Front. Water 3:727368.
doi: 10.3389/frwa.2021.727368
Infrastructural Violence: Five Axes of
Inequities in Water Supply in Delhi,
India
Ashok Kumar 1
*, Nitin Singh 1, Sarah Cooper 2, Anna Mdee 2and Shivani Singhal 2
1Department of Physical Planning, School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi, India, 2Department of Social Science,
School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds, Leeds, United Kingdom
Inequity is deeply embedded in the supply of drinking water in Delhi, India. Using the
concept of infrastructural violence, this paper exposes how past and present governance
of water has resulted in unequal distribution of supply across the city to exclude
vulnerable communities from accessing drinking water. This perspective broadens the
gaze away from a narrow gaze on the technical and structural aspects of infrastructure
to encompass the socio-political dimensions. This paper starts by outlining the history
of the water supply in Delhi. We then outline five axes of exclusion which can be read
as infrastructural violence and explores how aspects of water policy, legislation, and
planning uphold these injustices. Our discussion centers on how economics, political
ideology, and power infiltrate governing mechanisms to influence water infrastructure
to entrench poverty and marginalization. Attempts to improve water security for Delhi’s
residents face minimal impact without addressing these embedded inequities. Therefore,
our analysis offers a framework to systematically create awareness of the factors to be
addressed to enable a more equitable governance of water supply.
Keywords: infrastructural violence, active infrastructural violence, passive infrastructural violence, water
inequities, five axes of exclusions
INTRODUCTION
The city of Delhi in India has undergone extensive transformations over the recent decades. The
roots of this change are embedded in the drive for liberalization since the early 1990s, which
stimulated infrastructural planning to establish Delhi as a global city and as a world leader on the
international stage (Dupont, 2011; Ghertner, 2015; Baviskar, 2020). Actions to achieve this status
are epitomized by the hosting of the Commonwealth Games in 2010, where the authorities used
this event as a “catalyst for urban change” and an opportunity to showcase global ambitions of
making the city “world class.” Throughout this period and, particularly in a more recent on-going
restructuring of the urban landscape, analysis suggests that the socio-economic realities which
underpin this drive for urban change, and the nefarious routes taken to achieve this vision has
resulted in the marginalization and displacement of the urban poor (Dupont, 2008; Bhan and
Shivanand, 2013; Bhan, 2016).
India implemented Liberalization, Privatization, and Globalization (LPG) reforms
in 1991 which opened up various sectors, including water utilities, for global private
companies. As a consequence, the state passed responsibility for the delivery of
basic water and sanitation services to private companies whose primary aim was
to maximize their profits. This new water discourse was further bolstered by the
Ministry of Water Resources (2002) encouraged public-private partnerships in “planning,
development, and management of water projects for diverse uses, wherever feasible”

Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
(Ministry of Water Resources, Government of India, 2012). A
secret attempt was made to privatize the Delhi Jal Board (DJB),
the state institution delegated with the responsibility of water
supply and sanitation provisioning, just its establishment in 1998.
During the same period, Sonia Vihar Water Treatment Plant
whose construction, operation and management were awarded
by the DJB to global water giant Ondeo Degremont exacerbated
water inequity in parts of the city as initially it was decided that
Delhi’s new supply from Sonia Vihar will go to the richer South
Delhi areas, and not to poor neighborhoods (Shiva, 2006). Water
from Sonia Vihar WTP is supplied round the clock, and is meant
for residents of DJB’s South zones II and III, which comprises
more advantaged residents.
This period witnessed the development agenda shift from
welfare-oriented policy regimes to market-led policies; cities
transforming themselves, rhetorically at least, to hubs of
economic creation, urbanization, and industrialization. Due
to the negligible return from agricultural activities and the
negative connotations of them being viewed as “backward”
occupations (Bentinck, 2000, p. 100); there has been a structural
economic transformation, with people moving from agriculture
to the service sector. Moreover, increasing wealth and income
inequality have shifted the social narrative of poverty (Fernandes,
2006). Now slum dwellers are not suffering from poverty
but are deemed a nuisance. They do not fit in with global
aspirations, their lived reality, if not erased, is hidden. This
was evidenced by the “Pushta settlement evictions” before the
2010 Commonwealth Games, when slum dwellers were hidden
from view by bamboo screens (Baviskar, 2019). Intolerance to
poverty is now within the moral and ethical compass. Moreover,
justifications for evictions of the poor used by the state, police
and press, frames the evicted as foreigners. During the Pushta
demolition, residents were repeatedly referred to as Bangladeshi
and Pakistani (Adve, 2004).
There is a frustration seen among the middle class against
the welfare programs provided to the weaker sections of
the society (Chaplin, 2011, p. 66). This change has made
it possible to villainizing slum dwellers and paved the path
for their evictions and relocation. This can be seen in the
narrative of the state, the judiciary, the media, and the middle-
class population leading up to the Commonwealth Games
(Ghertner, 2015). Many infrastructure policies were launched
by the government in the wake of the Commonwealth Games.
These were supported by moralizing, modernizing, and cleanup
policies (Baviskar, 2019, p. 89). If the urban poor came in
the way of implementation of these policies, they were to
be set aside. The building of the Delhi Metro (underground
and overground public transport) and Akshardham Temple are
recent notable examples. Redevelopment of slum lands is another
illustration of restructuring and modernizing the city. This type
of transformative development of the city displaces the poor and
embeds inequality (Kumar, 2020; also see Kumar et al., 2021).
Evidence suggests that displacements and evictions of
low-income families are the visible spatial manifestations of
inequitable urbanization in India. Over-riding reasons for
displacements and evictions in Indian cities are clashes and
conflicts between the needs of the urban poor and the aspirational
classes (Baviskar, 2019). Moreover, while the middle class meets
its demand through unauthorized colonies, which in time are
legitimized and recognized by the government, whereas the
unauthorized residents of slums are more likely to be evicted.
Roy (2011, p. 259) refers to this as the “expansion of the urban
frontier, a making way and making space for the new Indian
middle class, through the smashing of the homes and livelihoods
of the urban poor,” a theme also explored by Watson (2009) and
Bentinck (2000).
This paper proposes that the concept of infrastructural
violence allows us to make sense of the processes which drive and
underpin inequalities in water access in Delhi.
Infrastructural violence questions the perceived material and
technical innocuousness of infrastructure, whilst highlighting
infrastructure’s ability to create and shape deep inequalities
within urban environments. We then turn our focus onto the
domestic water supply in Delhi and outline how the city’s colonial
legacy has shaped infrastructural inequality and exclusion in
contemporary Delhi. Within this context we identify five axes of
inequality and exclusion which drive infrastructural inequality
and then finally, we consider how these axes shape water
infrastructural violence in Delhi and set out the challenges that
need to be addressed to enable a more just and equitable future.
INFRASTRUCTURAL VIOLENCE IN THE
“WORLD CLASS CITY”
Official disregard for the urban poor is fundamentally illustrated
by inequitable access to basic services and the planning,
governance, and decision-making processes that sit behind
infrastructure provision. These decision-making processes are
embedded across multiple layers of governments, agencies, and
actors in a way that impedes accountability to the public
and obscures the responsibility of the state. Rodgers and
O’Neill (2012) refer to this phenomenon as “infrastructural
violence” derived from the concepts of “infrastructural power” by
Mann (1984) emphasizing institutional regulation of society by
elites. Infrastructural violence also links up with “infrastructural
warfare” coined by Graham (2004, 2006, 2010) producing
infrastructure provision that induces human suffering (Rodgers
and O’Neill, 2012, p. 403).
The concept of infrastructural violence shifts our perceptions
from the conventional understanding of infrastructure as
material and technical urban systems to infrastructure as socio-
technical regimes. So, infrastructural violence occurs when
residents are either excluded from essential infrastructures
such as water or sanitation services by acts of displacement
or inadequate infrastructure provisioning. Both denial and
exclusion cause human suffering. Infrastructural violence also
takes place through “articulations of infrastructure that are
designed to be violent” (Rodgers and O’Neill, 2012, p. 402).
Renu Desai explains that infrastructure is designed to be
violent by “the ways in which urban planning, policies and
governance forge infrastructure that produces . . . inadequacies
and everyday deprivations, burdens, inequities, tensions and
conflicts in residents’ lives” (Desai, 2018, p. 89).
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
Rodgers and O’Neill (2012) identify two types of
infrastructural violence: active and passive. When infrastructure
is intentionally designed to be violent, it is active, for instance,
the building of elite infrastructure such as a promenade for
sportspersons during the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi
after the demolition of slums. Passive infrastructural violence
refers to the “socially harmful effects derived from infrastructure’s
limitations and omissions.” For example, people are being
excluded from infrastructure networks. Truelove and O’Reilly
(2020, p. 5) further highlight the role of infrastructure as a force
that shapes social experiences and subjectivities, bringing into
focus the distinct position it has in mediating relations between
humans and their environment through the maintenance of,
for example, regulatory standards, corporate interests, social
expectations, and historical legacies of organization and supply
(Amin, 2014, p. 138).
Viewing infrastructure provision in this way highlights the
agency, power relations, and ideologies which sit behind decision
making and resourcing. In addition it draws attention to
uneven rights, application of regulations and distribution of
infrastructure; not only in the present but also as legacies from
the past where historical decisions collide with future aspirations
to produce and reproduce inequalities (Rodgers and O’Neill,
2012; Truelove and O’Reilly, 2020). Inequalities are further
entrenched through the socio-spatial decisions of infrastructure
providers, the rules of supply and tariffs, and the gulf of
access between geographical areas and demographic groups.
Truelove and O’Reilly (2020) probe further into these structural
injustices through the theme “infrastructural intersectionality”
which explores how the intersections of social identities such as
gender, class, caste, and power relations are further preserved or
exacerbated through infrastructures. This is illustrated in Delhi
by the development of the Delhi Metro, Akshardham Temple,
and the Commonwealth Games, where the intersectionality
of power, caste, religion, and class saw the clearing of poor
settlements and slums to make way for the aesthetics and needs
of the middle class. On similar lines, Sims’ (2021) fieldwork in
Laos shows that large infrastructure projects frequently manifest
in infrastructural violence for more disadvantaged populations.
Infrastructural violence in Delhi is by no means isolated to
these large, impactful showcase developments but also extends
to other (essential) infrastructural systems. In this paper, we
explore the extent to which this form of violence is inherent
within the supply of drinking water. Access to drinking water
in Delhi is deeply inequitable across all of its approximately 20
million inhabitants. An estimated half of these residents are not
connected to the centralized water network and have to rely
on other means such as tankers, private taps, tube wells, and
standpoints. Shortages of water are common in many areas of
the city. Many who are connected generally have water only
for 2–4 h a day, whereas some neighborhoods have 24-h access
(Truelove, 2019).
So, why do these inequities exist and why do they persist?
This is the question that underpins this paper. Here, we
seek to understand the actions and decisions which produce
discriminatory governance of the drinking water supply for the
urban poor. Through a historical and structured analysis, we aim
to make a contribution to the theme of infrastructural violence
by providing examples of how the relationships of hierarchy and
power manifest to create inequitable access.
We initially outline the context of demographic
marginalization in Delhi and how this relates to the water
supply. We then briefly turn to the history of water supply to
marginalized communities in Delhi to provide context as to how
inequity in the present-day system has become embedded. This
then frames five axes of exclusion relating to aspects of water
policy, legislation, and planning which continue to reproduce
water injustices. Our discussion centers on how economics,
political ideology, and power infiltrate governing mechanisms to
influence water infrastructure to entrench inequitable access to
services through forms of infrastructural violence.
WATER ACCESS AND MARGINALIZATION
IN DELHI
Many of Delhi’s residents live in slums or unauthorized
residential developments with high levels of deprivation, with
sub-standard accommodation and residents struggling to access
basic amenities like water and sanitation. The development of
Delhi as a world-class city has resulted in a mass influx of poor
migrants seeking employment whilst their cheap labor sustained
the “modernization” of the city (Biswas, 2020). It is estimated that
there are 450 million informal sector workers in India, nearly 90%
of the entire workforce. The total number of workers in Delhi
was 5,587,000 as per the Census of India 2011 (Government of
the National Capital Territory of Delhi, 2019, p. 89). Based on
the assumption that 90% of the working population is engaged in
the informal sector, the number of informal sector workers might
be in the region of 5,028,300. Informal workers are vulnerable,
characterized by low wages. They often lack medical insurance
(Bora, 2014), access to adequate housing and infrastructure, and
have limited collective bargaining capacity (Baviskar, 2019).
Current urban policies have perpetuated displacements and
evictions, and consequently continued to push the poor toward
the physical and societal periphery. Evictions of slums and
squatters from the city to its margins could be treated as the
domination of urban space by the elite; when evicted spaces
are rendered out of reach of the urban poor, owing to new
land uses such as malls and entertainment plazas. Geographical
distance from employment opportunities marginalizes the poor
by making access to these places potentially expensive for travel.
Long shifts make it impossible for the workers to travel from
the outskirts of the city to work. Moreover, there are no formal
residential areas planned for these workers near construction
sites and factories. As a result, they have little option other
than to build homes near their work areas. Here, exploitation in
the form of loss of livelihoods and domination in the form of
evictions from the city to the margins are not only socially and
spatially manifested, but also socially and spatially produced and
reproduced (Speak, 2012).
Most of these informal urban dwellers live in 6–10 m2huts in
slums, where water is accessed through public taps, tankers, and
tube wells. According to the Comptroller and Auditor General
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
TABLE 1 | Daily water supplied and population served through tankers in the DJB’s administrative divisions.
S. No. Division Quantum of water supplied in Million Gallons (MG) Population (‘000) Per capita water availability per day in liters (L)
2009–10 2010–11 2011–12 2009–10 2010–11 2011–12 2009–10 2010–11 2011–12
1. Central II 10.64 15.54 21.51 45 45 45 2.94 4.3 5.95
2. North West I 131.4 131.4 146 425 450 475 3.85 3.63 3.82
3. North West II 200.29 165.27 171.72 99.65 82.23 85.44 25 25 25
4. North West III 5.07 5.27 5.71 50 50 50 1.26 1.31 1.42
5. North East I 51.82 48.97 48.15 98 95 90 6.58 6.41 6.65
6. North East II 49.52 51.41 53.56 56 60 62 11 10.66 10.75
7. North East III 14.85 13.55 12.22 100 100 100 1.85 1.69 1.52
8. East I 15.41 15.45 15.41 66 66 66 2.9 2.91 2.9
9. East II 10.78 9.8 10.08 52.4 52.4 52.4 2.56 2.33 2.39
10. South I 70.44 60.19 80.79 310 310 310 2.83 2.42 3.24
11. South III 36.84 46.74 50.36 676 676 676 0.68 0.86 0.93
12. South IV 130 130 130 500 500 500 3.23 3.23 3.23
13. South West I 90 90 100 270 270 27 4.15 4.15 46.07
14. West III 106.93 106.93 106.93 215 215 215 6.19 6.19 6.19
15. North 3.5 46 48.5 400 450 500 0.11 1.27 1.21
Total 927.49 936.52 1000.94 3363.05 3421.63 3253.84 3.42 3.4 3.82
Source: Comptroller and Auditor General of India (2013).
of India (2013) report, during 2011–12 period 24.8% of the
households in Delhi were not connected to the DJB’s water
supply network. A majority of these households were part of the
unauthorized colonies and Jhuggi Jhopari clusters situated on
the periphery of the city. In the absence of formal water supply
infrastructure, water was being supplied through water tankers
and just 1,000.94 Million Gallon (MG) of water was supplied
for the whole year at the rate of 3.82 liters per capita per day
(LPCD) against the official norm of 172 LPCD (Comptroller and
Auditor General of India, 2013). Table 1 shows the quantum of
water supplied to around 3,300,000 people living is various parts
of Delhi out of which around 2,553,000 people were living in
informal settlements. This large portion of Delhi’s population was
relying on the provision of water through tankers in absence of
access to the centralized piped water supply system.
In extreme peripheral areas, residents are forced to buy
expensive bottled water from the private vendors, who buy water
from the DJB. Community toilets, if provided by the government,
generally do not work because the water for flushing is provided
only for few hours. Over a period of time, these community
toilets become dysfunctional and people have to resort to open
defecation. Census of India 2011 has reported that Delhi’s 10%
(2 million people) population openly defecates. Results of the
76th NSO survey conducted between July and December 2018
showed that 0.5% of Delhi’s population have no access to toilets
and 4.8% population uses community toilets with payment. Since
most community toilets do not work, in Delhi, 5.1% population
(867,000) has no option but to defecate in the open (NSO,
2018, p. 99).
Moreover, after centuries of caste-based discrimination, the
lower castes have higher levels of poverty. Even if people have the
same economic status, it has been reported that due to exclusion,
the lower castes will still have lesser water and sanitation facilities
(Kumar, 2014, p. 129). As a result, caste plays a prominent role
in infrastructure fragmentation. Despite the important role these
workers played in the development of Delhi, they are not treated
as full citizens, with the state viewing these communities as on the
margins of economic and social class. This is done by creating an
exclusionary citizenship narrative where the upper-middle-class
refers to themselves as “lawful citizens of Delhi” (Bhan, 2016).
This marks the rest as unlawful and non-citizens, targeting them
and stripping them of their rights. A manifestation of this view
can be seen when it comes to the city’s approach in supplying
drinking water (Biswas, 2020). We first examine the colonial
roots of present day inequalities.
Colonial Legacy of Infrastructural
Exclusion
Divisions within communities and access to water are not a
recent phenomenon and can be traced back to the Mughal times
in the sixteenth century. Delhi, the new capital city of the British
Empire was built in the first half of the twentieth century. The
city was built based on the modernist principles of order and
functionality. However, surveillance, discipline, and control of
the locals was also a prime motivation (Gooptu, 2001, p. 71).
Piped water and sanitation services were provided to all ruling
classes living in the white town, the Lutyens Delhi, named after
Edwin Lutyens, designer and planner of the city.
In contrast, from the twelveth to nineteenth century, residents
of Old Delhi predominantly relied on Baoli (a tank with steps
on four sides leading down to the water), neighborhood wells,
individual household wells, canals, and rivers. There were 607
wells in Delhi during the Mughal times. Due to the decentralized
system, locals had various ways of accessing water such as by
using the Persian wheel, a mechanical device used for lifting water
where the wheel is pulled by animals like bullocks, buffaloes, or
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
camels. Water was distributed locally in leather bags (Hardiman,
2002, p. 112). Class differentiation existed during the Mughal
times. Poor residents took water from rivers and canals while
the rich had dug wells in their houses and neighborhoods
(Hosagrahar, 2010, p. 114–116). Thus, the lower castes had to
rely on the upper castes. Moreover, this decentralized system was
not supported by the kings and could be disrupted by them.
For example, Sultan Alauddin Khilji forbade devotees to dig a
baoli at Sufi saint Nizamuddin Auliya’s shrine (Wescoat, 2014).
In this way, the Mughal and the British colonial legacies laid the
foundations of inequitable water supply systems in the city over
several centuries.
The water supply system was mostly decentralized in the pre-
British era. This continued until the revolt of 1857 prior to
which the Europeans and the Indians lived in a mixed settlement.
However, the post-1857 period residents saw clear segregation
of living spaces, and one-third of the city was demolished and
rebuilt to “sanitize, improve, and modernize.” There was a
need felt to “enlighten and civilize” the locals through superior
science and technology (Sharan, 2006, p. 4906). These steps
were also motivated by the safety of the British residents and
the health of the troops. Urban governance measures that were
being carried out in Britain since the 1840s were replicated in
India. Sanitary concerns of the “Indian” became important to the
British after the sanitation recommendations given by the Royal
Commission on the Sanitary State of the Indian Army in 1863.
The sanitary concerns however were strategic as the new army
and governmental zones were provided with water and sanitation
facilities and not the older parts of the town (Gooptu, 2001, p. 71).
The decentralized system of wells was classified as un-modern,
unimproved, and unsanitary and thus had to be replaced. The
state claimed ownership of all natural resources and instituted
taxation (Broich, 2007, p. 346). The introduction of piped water
in the 1890s resulted in a gradual but deliberate decay and closure
of wells (Gupta, 1981). It can be claimed that this centralization
of the water supply was a step closer to controlling and policing
the Indians efficiently.
While piped water was resisted in many parts of the British
Empire, in India the resistance focused on two major points.
Firstly, religious protests against piped water were carried out
by the Hindu community as piped water was believed to be
impure and could not be used in many religious ceremonies.
Additionally, the sealing of wells caused protests motivated by
traditional worship practices (Broich, 2007, p. 360). Secondly,
newspapers such as “Safir-i-Hind” and “Anjuman-i-Panjab”
raised voices against taxation demanded from locals to cover
infrastructure costs (Kishore, 2015, p. 457). However, Indians
gradually integrated piped water into their daily lives and
religious practices.
Along with replacing the wells, the wide network of Mughal
drains was replaced with a network of underground drains by the
Delhi Municipal Committee to modernize the system. However,
the inefficiency of this project can be seen by the statement issued
by the Sanitary Commissioner of Punjab in 1873 calling the
drains aimless and haphazard. Due to a purported shortage of
funds, piped water could not be made available to the Indian
part of the city. As a result, it was implemented in a targeted
way, prioritizing the white areas and the troops (Kishore, 2015,
p. 452). This questions the enlightenment quest claimed by the
British officials. Another change in water governance was the
application of public nuisance laws. While this law was borrowed
from the English judiciary, its Indian application saw extensive
use. It covered the destruction of public property that included
centralized water systems such as rivers and lakes (Anderson,
2011). As a result, mostly the economically lower sections of the
society, which mainly comprised lower castes and enjoyed using
water from public sources, were rendered as illegal users.
Therefore, three distinct water supply systems existed during
the British colonial period. A “modern” piped water supply
network covered New Delhi. This network was meant exclusively
for white rulers and Indian bureaucrats who served the Empire.
Rich Indians had dug wells within their houses, which formed
the second system of water supply. Other Indians, mostly poor
classes, procured water from public wells, canals, ponds, etc.
Therefore, a majority of the population did not have access to
safe drinking water. Limited access to the modern piped water
supply is clearly a visible form of active infrastructural violence
where infrastructure designed creates a form of violence toward
the poor Indian population.
The security and comfort of the colonial population appear to
be the underlying motivation in planning separate infrastructure
for the British ruling elite and the dominated Indians. However,
the situation was also more complex. Religious belief systems
agitating against the installation of modern networks of water
supply and provisioning of sanitation services combined with
caste and class produced a water supply infrastructure that
embeds violence to those most disadvantaged within it.
Caste identity played a huge part in preventing access to
water to lower castes, particularly the erstwhile untouchables
who were prohibited from using water bodies meant for the
higher castes. Those who protested against this unjust water
practice faced violence. A progressive resolution was passed in
1926 when the government of Bombay Provinces abolished this
unjust practice against the untouchables. The Chavdar Lake,
the largest reservoir in the Mahad municipality became the
focal point for asserting the untouchables’ right to water. On
19 March 1927 Babasaheb Bhim Rao Ambedkar led tens of
thousands of people gathered at the Chavdar Lake to exert
their right to water. Soon after touching the water of the
Chavdar Lake, violence followed. The higher castes “spared
no one–men, women, or children–knocking our food into the
dirt and pounding our utensils” (Jadhav, 2003, p. 39). Since
peaceful existence was the pre-requisite for the perpetuation of
the colonialist regime, the British supported the higher castes.
Consequently, on 4 August 1927, the progressive resolution was
revoked by the Mahad municipality. This incident might be
short-lived, but it gave rise to a movement to secure water rights
for the untouchables.
Overcoming historical legacies of power and privilege is
onerous because transcending these legacies requires actions
to dismantle the established regimes of which current political
parties have become an integral part. So the “civilizing mission”
of the colonial regime got easily extended into the Indian
republic’s polity after 1947 (Fischer-Tine and Mann, 2004).
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
Extension of this geographically and temporally uneven and
inequitable water regime has been so firmly established that
changing this system into a more egalitarian regime appears to
be an impossibility in the near future.
Post-colonial Water Supply: The
Continuation and Embeddedness of
Infrastructural Inequality
When elite Indians led by the first Prime Minister Jawaharlal
Nehru took reins of power from the British colonists in 1947,
the modernist policies of city building continued. Nehru looked
upon slums with disdain and wanted them demolished. He
aspired that all Indians should live in planned areas with access to
potable water and sanitation services. Modernist at heart, Nehru
wanted to build new towns such as Chandigarh. In Delhi, it was
he who brought in the Ford Foundation for the preparation of the
Master Plan for Delhi, 1981. Expectedly, the development plan
contained policies on slum rehabilitation and resettlement (Delhi
Development Authority, 1981). Delhi Master Plan, 1981 paved
the way for active and passive infrastructure violence toward
slum dwellers and general residents of Delhi. The old city of
Shahjahanabad had a gross density of 350 persons per acre with
congested built structures, lacking community facilities resulting
in poor living conditions. To improve the built environment of
the area its population density was proposed to be brought down
to 250 persons per acre. As a result, houses were demolished and
people were forced to relocate. The same measures were proposed
for other areas also to reduce the population density between 200
and 250 persons per acre. On a similar trajectory, quarry laborers
working and living in the Anand Parbat area were proposed to
relocate in the cheap housing units in the North and South of
Delhi. In order to provide housing to slum dwellers by relocation,
poor quality housing and infrastructure were built. The poor
housing and infrastructure were justified in the name of cost-
cutting and building by-laws, making a classic example of active
infrastructural violence toward the resettled (Delhi Development
Authority, 1981).
Active infrastructure violence was also seen when Prime
Minister, Indira Gandhi followed the principles of modernity
during the Emergency between 1975 and 1977 (Hameed,
2017, p. 111). In Delhi, there were large-scale expulsions of
people from the center to peripheral locations (Tarlo, 2003).
While around 700,000 families were evicted (Baviskar, 2020,
p. 152), only 152,300 were resettled (Dupont, 2004, p. 161).
Muslim settlements in Old Delhi were especially targeted by Mr
Jagmohan Malhotra, then Vice-Chairman of DDA, also known
as the “demolition man” (Hameed, 2017, p. 111). Through these
acts of active infrastructural violence, slum dwellers are forced
into long-term insecurity. Their fate depended on the leadership
of political parties and their agendas.
Drinking water production and distribution became an
increasing challenge for the post-colonial regimes in urban
India with a fast increasing city population, diminishing water
resources, inadequate financial resources to build water and
sanitation networks, and deteriorating quality of groundwater.
An old and inequitable system of water planning was easily
adopted in spite of loud political rhetoric of equal and
universal access.
Delhi has a long history of networked water supply. Delhi
Joint Water and Sewage Board (DJW& SB) was set up in 1926
by the British colonists and was responsible for the operation
and maintenance of waterworks in Delhi. However, its primary
beneficiaries were areas with colonial settlements. This included
the area of the Delhi Municipal Committee where a large majority
of ruling classes lived (Delhi Administration, 1976, p. 725).
The two most important governing arrangements that
exist today are DJB and the Delhi Development Authority
(DDA). These play a vital role in both the active and passive
infrastructural violence related to the water supply in Delhi. We
will explore this further below through a discussion of five axes
of infrastructural exclusion. Within 6 years of the formation of
the Delhi state, the DJB was created in 1998 by an act of the
Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. Delhi Jal
Board was responsible for procuring, processing, and distributing
water in Delhi Municipal Corporation area (now divided into
three corporations). It was also responsible for supplying bulk
water to New Delhi Municipal Council and Delhi Cantonment
Board. Moreover, it provides sanitation services in the entire city
of Delhi.
Delhi Development Authority was set up by an act of
Parliament in 1957. The DDA was made responsible for the
planned and orderly development of the city-state by preparing
master development plans. In addition to DJB, the DDA also
formulates water policies and norms through successive master
plans. When new areas are developed, the DDA declares
them as “development areas” where it is responsible for
building infrastructure and providing all utilities including water
and sanitation services before handing over these areas to
a municipality.
IDENTIFYING AXES OF
INFRASTRUCTURAL EXCLUSION IN DELHI
Exclusion and denial both form part of infrastructural violence.
Exclusion of the poor from accessing piped water occurs
in multiple ways. In this section, we examine five dynamic
forms of exclusion in current water infrastructure provision:
legal exclusion; commodification and privatization; poor
co-ordination; planning exclusion; and over-estimation of
water supply.
Infrastructural Violence Through Legal
Exclusion
A clear example of exclusion is illustrated within legislation
governing water supply. The DJB is well aware that it under-
serves the poor and marginal groups. For example, DJB’s internal
note of 2004 concludes that “there is a need for targeted
interventions to cater to the water and sanitation needs of the
poor” (p. 8 as quoted in Sheikh et al., 2015). Rhetorical concern
about the poor of Delhi is laudable. But in actual practice, Delhi
Jal Board Act is openly discriminatory. For instance, section 9(1a)
of the DJB Act 1998 says that DJB will not “provide water supply
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
TABLE 2 | Population residing in informal settlements of Delhi, 2014.
S. No. Type of informal settlement Population
1. Jhuggi Basti 1,700,000
2. Unauthorized colonies 4,000,000
3. Homeless and pavement dwellers 16,000
Total population residing in informal settlements 5,716,000
Percent of total population 33.62
Source: Planning Department, Government of NCT of Delhi (2019).
to any premises which have been constructed in contravention of
any law . . . .”
Once unauthorized colonies and slums are regularized, the
DJB becomes responsible for providing water in these areas.
In non-notified slums, those slums that are deemed illegal
occupation, the DJB has no obligation to provide water or
sanitation services. However, under pressure from political
leaders and courts, the DJB provides water to non-notified slums.
But the main point is that legally speaking the DJB is not
obliged to provide water to any illegally built residential areas,
which include most of the unauthorized settlements and slums,
where a large majority of Delhi residents live. The legislation
governing water supply illustrates active infrastructural violence.
The DJB has no legal obligation to provide water to non-notified
or illegal occupations. However, this active violence is limited
by the state to some extent through the provision of water
and sanitation services to non-notified areas overlooking their
illegalities. Provisions of the DJB Act 1998 clearly marginalize
and exclude a large proportion of citizens living in Delhi from
accessing water from the network (see Table 2). So, it can be
argued that the water provisioning statute is exclusionary.
However, complications in this picture arise when enough
political and legal pressure (through court verdicts) is exerted
on the state bureaucracy that the same state stands with the
citizens and ensures water provisioning through tankers and
other means. Here, the state is simultaneously complacent in
generating infrastructural violence by enacting laws to make
such provisioning illegal, presumably with the intention of
putting a stop to the spread of illegal developments. But
when the state fails to contain illegal developments, it acts to
limit infrastructural violence by temporarily providing water
to thirsty populations. For example, on 31 August 2020, the
Supreme Court ordered the removal of 48,000 slum clusters
located within the safety zone of railway lines in Delhi. The
Government of India informed the court through a submission
by the Solicitor General that it was not possible immediately
without exploring alternatives because over 200,000 families
would be displaced if these people are evicted. One of the
petitioners from the opposition party further noted: “Slum
dwellers have a fundamental right to the city. They are an
integral part of the social and economic fabric of the town...
If the demolition of slums is carried out amidst the current
pandemic, more than 250,000 persons will be forced to move
around the city in search of shelter and livelihood” (The Hindu,
2020). Under such political pressure, infrastructure violence is
temporarily put on hold and slum dwellers continue to access
water and other services. This process of excluding the poor from
potable water is therefore active violence as the state actively
refuses to supply fixed infrastructure but transforms this into,
passive violence because of the uncertainty of water provisioning
provided through irregular and inequitable supply of water
by tankers.
Infrastructural Violence Through
Commodification and Privatization
If all else fails, one way to get access to potable water in Delhi
is bottled water. The DJB and private vendors sell bottled water
in Delhi. Millions of bottles of one liter or half a liter are served
every day by private corporate vendors. However, what is most
striking is the fact that the DJB sells 20-L water canisters to
private vendors who in turn sell them to households who cannot
access potable water from any other source. They are generally
poor people who either do not have access to water through the
network because they are not connected or water through the
network is insufficient for their basic needs.
The DJB’s bottled water is expensive when compared with
its piped water price per liter. For example, the starting tariff
in Delhi is Rs 2.42/kl for piped water supply. Dwarka’s middle-
class residents pay Rs. 11/kl for piped supply and Rs. 47/kl for
water supplied through tankers (Times of India, 2015). Corporate
vendors sell 1 kl of water in canisters to the poor at the steep
rate of Rs. 2,600 (Delhi Jal Board, 2015), which is 236 times
higher than water supplied through the network. Treating water
as a commodity with an instrumental value alone excludes the
most vulnerable. This system of water supply through 20-L water
canisters represents another example of active infrastructural
violence, where infrastructure is designed to be violent through
pricing (Desai, 2018). The way in which infrastructure is put
together generates deprivations, inequities, conflicts, and denials.
Infrastructural violence also takes place through the
privatization of the water supply. The Government of National
Capital Territory of Delhi has made attempts to involve the
private sector in selected areas with the objective of enhancing
the level of water services, meaning making water available
24 ×7. The aim of the policy is to provide better services to
those who can afford. This policy is meant to increase the level
of ser vice by providing 24 h piped water supply to residents with
improved water infrastructure. This project includes Mehrauli
and Vasant Vihar, which are largely high middle income and rich-
class areas (see Figure 1). To provide a better water supply, the
MVV Water Utility Private Limited has been selected through a
tendering process and tasked to improve the level of service in
Mehrauli and Vasant Vihar. Work is awarded to a consortium of
SPML Infra, Tahal Consulting Engineers and Hagihon Jerusalem
Water and Wastewater Works (MVV), on Design,Build, Operate
and Transfer basis by the DJB. The agreement to carry out this
project was signed on 12 September 2012, some 9 years ago. The
improved systems would be managed by the MVV for 2 years
(MVV Water Utility Private Limited, 2013, p. 8).
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
FIGURE 1 | Excluded areas from the project for enhancing level of service.
The President of the Vasant Vihar RWA gave consent to
this project. With the World Bank loan of US$ 224 million, it
targeted 150,000 meter network and 500,000 populations with
200 LPCD target. Initially, the project with the support of the
World Bank was initiated in 2002, and this project would have
ended by 2005 and entire Delhi by 2015. Some scholars have
likened this project of 24 ×7 water supply scheme in Vasant
Vihar, southern Delhi to “exit the penury syndrome” (Ruet, 2007,
p. 17). Exit the penury syndrome placed within the exclusionary
global city narrative represents the Indian cities as spaces capable
of sustaining higher standards of infrastructure provisioning and
water supply services for specific classes.
Nevertheless, as we can see from Figure 1, this project
deliberately excludes the poor areas shown in light yellow color
on the edges of the project area. These areas are Coolie Camp,
Slum Area Vasant Vihar, JJ Colony in the southern parts of
the project site, and Gaon Basant Nagar in the eastern parts.
Exclusion of these poor areas could not be seen more visibly,
there is not even a pretense of inclusion. This is an episode of
active infrastructural violence.
Infrastructural Violence Through Lack of
Coordination
Passive infrastructural violence can also result from a lack of
coordination between the DJB and the DDA. This can be seen by
the Dwarka sub-city planning among other examples. Dwarka is
a comprehensively planned new sub-city of 1,000,000 population
near the Indira Gandhi International airport. This large township
was planned and built in the early 1990s by the DDA for the rising
population of middle and elite groups. In the initial years, water
was provided through 400 tankers twice a week. The DDA bought
water in bulk from the DJB and provided it to the residents of
Dwarka However full requirements could not be met through
tankers due to their limited capacity (see Figure 2 for the location
of the sub-city).
A relevant question is why no piped water was supplied for
15 years to the residents of Dwarka. The DJB officers tell us
that the township was built without bothering to consult the
DJB for water supplies. Dwarka got piped water supply from
the DJB in February 2015 after nearly 15 years of the existence
of the new town. Similarly, another DDA planned settlement
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
FIGURE 2 | Location of Dwarka and Narela sub-city in NCT of Delhi.
called Narela with a population of 225,000 does not have access
to the piped water supply. As for Dwarka, until recently Narela
got water supplies through tankers. The same pattern of violence
caused through lack of coordination can be expected to continue
as the DJB has not been consulted for the recently approved
Land Pooling Policy 2013, which would result in 1.7 million
housing units in the near future (Master Plan for Delhi-2021,
Delhi Development Authority, 2007) with little consideration of
water supply.
Failure of coordination among agencies with different
responsibilities falling under different legislations is a
cause of infrastructural violence against all income classes
through exclusion from networked water supplies for
many years. Planning and development of new townships
in Delhi appear to proceed without careful consideration
of supply of potable water. Even middle-class residents
have to rely on water provided through tankers. Water
networks become operational only after several years of
township development.
Infrastructural Violence via City Planning
Passive infrastructural violence is also illustrated in the city’s
planning system seen by studying the various versions of the
master plans of Delhi. The inequitable intent of the city planning
agency is highly visible through the three Master Plans of 1981,
2001, and 2021.
The first Master Plan for Delhi1was prepared by the DDA
with the help of the Ford Foundation team led by Albert Meyer
and came into force in 1962. This plan had the horizon year
1Master Plan for Delhi is a physical development plan for the city. It has two parts,
one containing city planning policies and the other planning norms and standards.
The document is supported by a land use map for the horizon year, effectively
proposing how land would be used in the next 20 years.
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
of 1981. In the Plan, while work studies were comprehensive, it
only spared one paragraph for water policy, giving little space
and thought to water planning. After we closely examined the
Master Plan for Delhi, 1981, and associated work studies, we
made several interesting discoveries.
The DDA divided Delhi into three parts: Class A: Delhi
Urban Area; Class B: Ghaziabad, Faridabad, and Ballabgarh;
Class C: Gurgaon, Bahadurgarh, Narela, and Loni. These three
settlement classes are based on location, stage of development,
and population. The master plan policy clearly suggests that
central place with large population (Delhi Urban Area) where
the most powerful politicians and bureaucrats reside, deserves
more water than smaller towns located on the periphery of
the metropolis. So, the DDA proposed different water supply
standards and different times for supply of water to these areas.
The standard of water supply for Class A i.e., Delhi Urban Area
was set at 50 gallons per capita per day. The standard for Class
B including Ghaziabad, Faridabad, and Ballabgarh was set at
45 gallons per capita per day and for Class C i.e., Gurgaon,
Bahadurgarh, Narela, and Loni, at that time upcoming future
towns, the standard was set at a much reduced rate of 35 gallons
per capita per day. The Master Plan for Delhi, 1981 also proposed
that water will be supplied in Delhi and the Ring Towns with
different time durations. For Class A i.e., Delhi Urban Area, the
planning agency intended to supply water for 24 h. However, in
practice, it was found that water could be supplied only for 18 h.
In Class B towns such as Ghaziabad, Faridabad, and Ballabgarh,
the intent of the planning agency was to supply water for 18 h. But
it could supply water in these areas only for 16 h. In Class C areas
i.e., Gurgaon, Bahadurgarh, Narela, and Loni water was proposed
and supplied for 12 h (Delhi Development Authority, 1981; also
see Table 4).
Moreover, the availability of water determined the growth
potential and economic significance of various ring towns,
towns located around Delhi. Ghaziabad was the most populated
town with a total population of 357,000 in 1981 and it
was envisaged as an industrial town with 50,000 workers in
manufacturing work. Similarly, Faridabad, Ballabgarh towns
of Haryana state and Loni and Narela towns in Delhi had
strong manufacturing units. Water requirements of these two
adjacent towns were expected to be met easily by tube wells
and good underground water resources. However, due to the
absence of good water resources, the development and growth
of Gurgaon and Bahadurgarh towns were expected to be low
(Delhi Development Authority, 1981). The act of leaving behind
certain ring towns in the plan due to low water resources instead
of the plan facilitating equitable growth is in itself a form of active
infrastructural violence.
This practice of making essential services like water supplies
available in different areas for different time durations and with
different standards is exclusionary at its root. Mostly, people
living in the periphery of the city would get reduced amounts
of water for reduced time periods (also see Table 4). Heavy
reliance on government framed norms appears to be the most
probable reason for different standards for different areas. Like
the colonists, elected governments have also provided more water
per capita per person to people living in or close to the seat
TABLE 3 | Water supply variations in different areas of Delhi, 1999–2018.
Area category Name of the
area
Water supply
norm, 1999
(LPCD)
Water supply
norm, 2018
(LPCD)
Comprehensively NDMC 462 440
planned Delhi Cantonment
Board Area
509 509
New Delhi and
South Delhi
148 228
Civil Lines and
Rohini
274 228
Shadhara 130 228
West Delhi 202 228
Unplanned/Old Old Delhi 277 –
city Karol Bagh 337 –
Pahar Ganj 201 –
Outer Delhi Narela 31 40
Najafgarh 74 40
Dwarka 74 228
Mehrauli 29 40
Source: Delhi 1999–A Fact Sheet NCRPB; Planning Department, Government of NCT of
Delhi (2019) and Delhi Jal Board (2016).
TABLE 4 | Different time durations and different standards of water supply, 2007.
Class A—Delhi Class B—Ring Towns Class C—Ring Towns
(Delhi Urban Area) (Ghaziabad, Faridabad,
Ballabgarh)
(Gurgaon, Bahadurgarh,
Narela, Loni)
Per capita supply 50
gallons
Per capita supply 45
gallons
Per capita supply 35 gallons
24 h supply per day 16h supply p er day 12h supply per day
Must supply
between 4 a.m. and
10 p.m.
Continuous supply from
4 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Continuous supply 5–11 a.m.
and 4–10 pm in domestic
areas, major industries should
meet their requirements from
tube wells
– Sources to be ground
water, infiltration galleries,
and wells
Sources to be tube wells,
infiltration wells to avoid
mechanical treatment
Major industry should
meet their requirement
from bore to small size
tube well
Road washing, horticulture
from local wells and ponds
Source: Compiled by the authors from Master Plan for Delhi (2021).
of power. New Delhi Municipal Council gets more water than
any other area (Hosagrahar, 2005, 2010; Sharan, 2006; also see
Table 3).
The next version of the Master Plan for Delhi was enforced in
1990 with the time horizon of 2001. Based on self-devised norms,
this development plan proposed a uniform standard of water
supply at the rate of 80 gallons per capita per day throughout
Delhi. Out of 80 gallons per capita per day, 50 gallons per capita
per day was meant for drinking purposes throughout Delhi. Ring
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
FIGURE 3 | Water inequities in Delhi, 1999.
towns2were not discussed in this plan, probably because the
Regional Plan, 2001 was notified in 1989. Additionally, DDA
being the land owning agency in Delhi, allocated land to the
DJB for building water treatment plants and sewage treatment
plants. Although it was an improvement over the previous master
plan, and a high standard of water supply was set for domestic
purposes, inequities in water supply persisted.
Analysis of the Master Plan for Delhi 2001 revealed that the
development plan was highly aspirational in terms of high-end
2Towns located around Delhi and forming a ring are called ring towns.
developments like building malls, middle class, and elite housing,
but did not take into account the important issue of inequities
of water in Delhi as not a single word was written in the plan
on equitable distribution of water among various types of areas
and populations. Due to this limitation, the Master plan policies
and DJB policies on water could not eliminate water inequities
in the city and remained inherently violent (see Figure 3). As the
map shows, clearly, inner areas receive more water per person
per day than peripheral areas. Some areas like the NDMC receive
nearly 500 L of water per person per day in comparison to
other areas only receiving 25 L per person per day. So far, the
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
planning agency’s focus remained on aggregate water production
and distribution, and also on setting high water supply standards.
Elite areas like New Delhi Municipal Council and Delhi
Cantonment buy water in bulk and therefore these areas do
not form part of DJB’s water zones. However, areas located in
central parts of the city like Old Delhi and Karol Bagh receive
considerably higher amounts (over 250 LPCD) of water. These
areas are located in Northwest IV, Central I and Central II zones
of the DJB. Similarly, Civil Lines and Rohini, two high income
planned areas, also receive higher amounts of daily water supplies
and they are located in North West I, part of North West II, and
part of West III. West Delhi, New Delhi and South Delhi are
also inhabited by high and middle income groups and receive
moderately higher amounts (135–225 LPCD) of water. These
three areas are located in South West I and II, West I, South I
to IV and South West III zones. Narela is located in the DJB’s
North West II, North I and West III while Mehrauli is located
in South I zone. Both Narela and Rohini house low income
resettlement areas and receive lower quantities of daily water
supplies. Shadhara is located in the DJB’s North East I and II, East
I and East II zones. This area receives comparatively less amounts
of daily water compared to the central parts of the city as most of
its residents belong to middle income and low income groups.
Dwarka, a planned sub-city located in South West I and II zones
of the DJB, receives moderate quantities of water for daily use.
As we move away from the city center, daily water supplied to
residents living in different zones also reduces and least amount
of water is supplied in resettlements areas (read Figure 3 with
Table 1).
Trying to find a middle ground, the DDA ended up providing
a high standard of water supply at the rate of 45 gallons per capita
per day in its Master Plan for Delhi 2021, which was enforced
on 7 February 2007. The plan argues that there is a need for
capacity building through the principle of “user pays approach”
and this policy should be implemented through public-private
partnerships. This is very typical of the mainstream international
language on the water in this period based on the neoliberal
approach to service delivery. Commodification and privatization
are central to this plan when neoliberal economic and political
thinking took the center stage after structural economic reforms
(Hope et al., 2013; see Mohan, 2017). Privatization of potable
water was also seen in the Plan through the Land Pooling Policy
2013 by the DDA. This policy handed over future development to
the private sector, which gives further credence to the continued
inequitable and violent distribution of potable water.
The plan also emphasized that there is a need to improve
efficiency through better community participation and
decentralized management. Promoting efficiency further,
the plan also proposed that the percent of non-revenue water
should be reduced as the estimated water losses stand at 40%.
The plan was also concerned about water conservation through
an integrated community-driven model. To pursue this line of
thinking, the DDA made proposals for making amendments to
the Delhi Water Board Act, 1998. However, it should be noted
that the DJB itself is responsible for the largest proportion of the
non-revenue water. Moreover, it is estimated that the planned
areas, due to faulty meters, are the next highest contributors to
the non-revenue water after the DJB (Comptroller and Auditor
General of India, 2013). However, the informal settlements are
the ones who are blamed and targeted by various governmental
agencies and the middle class and elite for the alleged theft of
water (Truelove, 2018). This can be seen in past community-
driven models which were meant to serve the middle classes and
penalized the informal settlements (Truelove and Mawdsley,
2011, p. 419). As a result, while improving the efficiency by
reducing non-revenue water through community-driven models
is commendable, it targets the already most marginalized.
The Master Plan for Delhi 2021 acknowledges water inequities
but provides no mechanisms to reduce them because of its entire
focus on efficient production and distribution of potable water in
line with the central government’s neoliberal economic policies.
There is no word on balancing efficiency with equity in the
plan. In fact, as discussed above, DDA does not acknowledge
the existence of slum areas as they are regarded as an illegal
occupation on public lands and so deserve demolition. In
the Master for Delhi, 2021, the approach to water planning
changed from water provisioning to water management with an
emphasis on water commodification and privatization. However,
water inequities continue to persist enabling the continuation of
infrastructural violence.
Furthermore, the DDA has outsourced the preparation of the
Master Plan for Delhi, 2041 to a central government controlled
urban studies research organization, the National Institute of
Urban Affairs. Considering that this agency has neoliberal
leanings in line with the controlling Ministry of Housing and
Urban Affairs, it is expected that the plan will say less on
the removal of inequities and more on the commodification
of water.
Infrastructural Violence via
Over-estimation of Actual Water Supply
Overestimation causes passive infrastructural violence by hiding
inequalities, first, of the quantity of water supplied and second,
about irregularities within the extraction of non-revenue water.
The DJB measures its success in terms of aggregate water
supplied from all the treatment plants rather than the number
of people who receive adequate, affordable, and quality water
regularly. Moreover, non-revenue water or the water lost during
distribution too is calculated in absolute terms. As a result, water
shortages faced by informal settlements, both due to low water
supply by the state and loss of water due to extraction in large
quantities by actors such as industries, remain hidden.
In 2013, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India
(CAG) through its comprehensive audit found that the DJB
lacked an information system to collect and analyse data on
water production and distribution of potable water. The auditors
argued that the DJB looks at the total treated raw water per
day as the total installed capacity of its treatment plants in
Delhi and then divides by the current population, theoretically
obtaining per capita per day water produced. Water treatment
plants are assumed to be working at 100% capacity. For example,
the installed capacity of all water treatment plants in Delhi is
estimated to be 833 million gallons per day (MGD), and if this
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
is divided by Delhi’s population of nearly 17 million, it gives a
figure of 200 L per person per day (Truelove, 2018, p. 8–10). But
this figure is notional because one does not know how much
water came into treatment plants and how much water reached
each district, household, or industry. The DJB also cannot tell
with any certainty how much water is actually distributed to the
residents connected with the network because it does not have
systems like functional pump meters in district metering areas.
Moreover, the available water is pulled using electric motors by
the underserved middle-class residents. Their ability to fulfill
the shortages by technical solutions causes direct violence to the
informal settlements by pulling water away from them.
Most importantly, over 40% of the total water is estimated
to be non-revenue water i.e., water lost during distribution. A
hidden distributive injustice and violence masks the differential
allocations of water in practice. For example, due to over-
extraction by influential consumers like the industry or private
tankers, less water per person reaches a majority of the
networked but poor populations. As a result, as discussed above,
informal settlements must pay for this loss of water by being
unproportionately fined for illegal extraction and through getting
reduced water supply.
In the absence and irregularity of all this information, it
is an erroneous calculation that the DJB supplies water at the
rate of 200 L per person per day. Truelove (2018) argues that
water inadequacies and exclusions are erased through deliberate
overestimation of water production, a form of active violence.
DISCUSSION
We have explored five axes of infrastructural exclusion in the
water supply of Delhi in the contemporary period. Through
the conceptual lens of infrastructural violence, we have argued
that the combination of legal statutes, commodification and
privatization of water, and infrastructure planning decisions all
constitute active forms of infrastructural violence.
Second, infrastructural violence expresses spatialization of
injustices through the use of state/elite power. Here, exploring
the historical context of how “people, materials, and territories
have been controlled and organized” is important to understand
the context and flows of power. Hawkins (2014, p. 300) explores
the formation of the state over the years, and concludes that
state sustains elite power and draws on elite power to maintain
and enhance state power and capacity. This epitomizes the
notion of “infrastructural power” as stated by Mann (1984) when
referring to the development and manipulation of infrastructure
to uphold dominant social class structures in order to suppress
the lower classes (Rodgers and O’Neill, 2012, p. 404). A poignant
example is discussed by both Hawkins (2014) and Tarrow
(2018) who show the central role of a country’s security,
and the necessity of the state to hold political power over
the military by controlling resources. So, it is possible to
sustain and strengthen state power/elite power by designing and
provisioning infrastructure in specific ways. We could therefore
argue that the state and infrastructural violence normally
go together.
Third, the historical perspective, of the organization of water
supply within both Mughal and British colonial eras, provides
context and credence to the acceptance and normalization
of division and inequity we witness today at the political,
legal, economic, social, and technical levels of water supply.
The paper has shown that the historical continuity of
water inequities has enabled the displacement of a water
equity agenda.
Fourth, infrastructural violence, among other things, is a
class phenomenon. The objective of provisioning water services
TABLE 5 | Forms of water infrastructural violence.
S. no. Elements Description Consequences Infrastructural
violence
1. Legal infrastructural
violence
When statutory provisions actively consider
water provisioning to illegally built areas beyond
their responsibility.
People living in non-notified un-authorized areas
and slums get excluded from provisioning of water
by the DJB.
Active infrastructural
violence
2. Infrastructural violence
via planning
The DJB provides water at different rates and
time durations.
Peripheral and comparatively low income areas and
populations get less water per person per day.
Passive
infrastructural
violence
3a. Infrastructural violence
through
commodification
A new water supply system is built to exclude
the poor and marginalized populations.
Inadequate access to potable water, for example,
20 L water canisters are being supplied by private
vendors.
Active infrastructural
violence
3b. Infrastructural violence
through privatization
Level of water service to be enhanced for the
middle income and elite groups.
Exclusion of the poor areas and populations. Active and passive
infrastructural
violence
4. Infrastructural violence
through lack of
coordination
The planning agency and water supply agency
fail to coordinate.
The DDA developed planned areas get excluded
from water supplies.
Passive
infrastructural
violence
5. Infrastructural violence
via over-estimation
Total treated water from all WTPs is assumed
to have been supplied to individuals and
households. Water supply calculations are
based on erroneous assumptions.
On average one may arrive at a decent supply per
person per day. On the ground poor people lose out
and get little water as nearly half the water is lost
(stolen) during distribution.
Passive
infrastructural
violence
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
to high income groups not only excludes slum dwellers from
piped water networks; it also inflicts infrastructural violence by
proportionately reducing quality as well as quantity of water
supplied to them via disconnection (see Table 1). A discussion
on exclusions alone does not sufficiently focus on violent
policy outcomes. For instance, in the case of water supply in
Delhi, it assumes away bad intentions of water provisioning
in illegally built areas without debating contextual factors such
as poverty that led to illegal occupation of public lands by
the urban poor. Exclusions pay no attention to the failure of
implementation of planning policies to build affordable housing
because of which the poor have to live in slums with little access
to infrastructure.
Fifth, infrastructural violence based on commodification
and privatization of water is also ideological. In the
present times, neoliberalism is the dominant paradigm of
planning and development promoting marketization and
its supporting institutional scaffolding. Delhi like many
cities worldwide has joined the race for global recognition
under the influence of neoliberal ideology, which seeks
to promote unfettered markets, free flows of capital, and
“discourses of symbolic formations arranged around [such]
persuasive political ideas” (Ahmed, 2011, p. 164). Cities being
the mainstay of wealth creation, this ideological shift has
resulted in the accentuation of poverty, inequality, and class
divisions in Delhi as governments continue to focus on profit
maximization (Ghosh, 2020).
Sixth, cultural practices such as an entrenched caste
system and gender norms work in combination with the
dominant neoliberal economic ideology to enable the elite
to maintain control over the state. In turn, unaccountable
governments and religious identity based discriminations
continuously reproduce infrastructural violence. Discriminatory
ideologies are thus performed and enacted through water
policies, plans, laws, and practices via the exercise of state/
elite power.
Seventh, blurred lines of accountability is an important
attribute of infrastructural violence. Blurring due to lack
of credible information in the public sphere likely shapes
infrastructural violence as it reduces the possibility of
fixing responsibility and accountability of water providers.
With the case of Tanzania, Mdee and Thorley (2016)
argue that trying to unpack lines of blame for service
delivery failure is a necessary first step to any possibility of
accountability. In the case of Delhi, infrastructural violence
is also inflicted via over-estimation of potable water supplied
per person per day, which is based on problematic and
limited calculations.
Finally, a lack of transparency and a culture of secrecy
perpetuates infrastructural violence as these acts reduce
accountability and fixing of responsibility becomes difficult. Data
on the water provisioning system in Delhi is highly secretive
and sharing data with researchers is limited and the data is
ambiguous. As Truelove (2018, p. 1) underscores, secrecy
and ambiguity underpins political abuse. However, pinning
responsibility on particular organizations and individuals—
the primary goal of attempting to understand infrastructural
violence—is perplexing because the “very nature of the scale, pace
and in a conceptual space from which infrastructure develops
support in the difficulty in attributing blame and responsibility”
(Rodgers and O’Neill, 2012, p. 402). Another difficulty about
attribution of policy consequences is that all outcomes are not
planned in advance. Deeper investigations through the lens
of infrastructural violence help us in shedding light on the
questions of sustainability and perpetuation of accountable
water provisioning systems by treating infrastructure as more
than physical collection of technologies (Amin, 2014; also see
Table 5).
We assert that our five identified axes exclusion in water
supply also underpin the wider dynamics of infrastructural
violence. We end this section with a summary of the five axes
observed in Delhi in Table 5.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
Centered on five axes of exclusion, this paper delineates the
contours of infrastructural violence in the provisioning of
potable water in Delhi. We argue that infrastructural violence
takes place due to five exclusions suffered by the most
marginalized groups of population living in slums. To a great
extent responsibility for these exclusions can be pinned on the
state through design of policies, plans, statutes, and cultural
practices. Clearly showing the workings of the five dimensions
of infrastructural violence, we have provided evidence for both
historical roots and contemporary dynamics of exclusions’ based
on infrastructural violence.
Historical legacies of colonialism have set the stage for
fragmented provision of water supplies to people of different
social identities and economic classes. The conditions created
by the colonists historically prevented the poor and lower castes
from accessing good quality water. Post-colonial democratic
governments have followed similar policies in the absence of
low levels of public accountability. Lack of transparency and
rent seeking behavior of government servants has further made
it nearly impossible to have better access to safe water. Of
course, the same water systems serve middle and elite classes
(the civil society) very well because of their influential civic
agency (Chatterjee, 2004, p. 38; also see Chaplin, 2011). Unjust
water laws such as the Delhi Jal Board Act, 1998 are brutally
violent, particularly through their avoidance of responsibility for
residents living in slums. Instead of addressing this inequity, the
process of backdoor privatization, justified through a narrative
of enhancing level of service, reinforces historical dynamics of
exclusion. Commodification of water by the DJB, leading to
the sale of bottled water, among others, to people living off
the network promulgates active infrastructural violence. Bottled
water produced by the DJB and sold to the poor through private
vendors is violent in design.
Building on the theoretical framework of “infrastructural
violence,” our analysis has shown that policies and laws have
persistently contained elements of infrastructural violence.
More recent enabling policies of the neoliberal state have
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Kumar et al. Five Axes of Infrastructure Violence
only accentuated infrastructural violence and increased
inequality. Untangling these exclusions will not be easy and
requires extensive reforms including political willingness, and
institutional capability.
DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT
The original contributions presented in the study are included
in the article/supplementary materials, further inquiries can be
directed to the corresponding author/s.
AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS
All authors listed have made a substantial, direct and intellectual
contribution to the work, and approved it for publication.
FUNDING
This research work is supported by Water Security and
Sustainable Development Hub which is funded by the UK
Research and Innovation’s Global Challenges Research Fund
(GCRF), grant number: ES/S008179/1.
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