Census: 1 in 6 in Indian cities live in slums

Photo: Times Herald

timesherald.com – Mumbai, India (AP), March 22, 2013

A new census report says one in six people in Indian cities live in some 100,000 sprawling slums with conditions “unfit for human habitation.” The statistics are India’s first complete count of its vast slum population.

The census identified 13.8 million households — about 64 million people — located in slums in urban areas around the country.

A whopping 41 percent of households in Mumbai, India’s financial capital and largest city, were located in overcrowded shantytowns, where most residents are squatting illegally and many have little access to basic sanitation.

More than one-third of slum homes surveyed had no indoor toilet and 64 percent were not connected to sewerage systems.

However, 70 percent had televisions and 64 percent had cellphones.