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MEHTA-DISSERTATION.Pdf Copyright by Nishtha Mehta 2011 The Dissertation Committee for Nishtha Mehta Certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: “Water Thieves:” Women, Water, and Development in New Delhi, India Committee: Bjorn Sletto, Supervisor Sarah Dooling Elizabeth Mueller Kamran Ali Jacqueline Angel “Water Thieves:” Women, Water, and Development in New Delhi, India by Nishtha Mehta, B.S.; M.U.P Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin December 2011 DEDICATION To my parents, Who are extremely proud (and very relieved) To M. (198_ to 2011) Acknowledgements During the first week of my doctoral degree, one of my professors mentioned that writing a dissertation is similar to running a marathon. And, as I slowly crossed each mile-marker, I accumulated many debts. First and foremost, I would like to thank my parents, Sadhana and Sachinder Mehta, for their unswerving faith, pivotal support, and unwavering understanding. My father‘s sense of humor, creativity, and intellectual curiosity have always been my greatest inspiration. My mother has been a sounding board for both academic and personal dilemmas, and I am extremely thankful for her constant friendship, patience, and love. I could not have done this without them. My sister, Medha, brother-in-law, Manish and, especially, my nephew Krishiv provided refuge in Nepal when I needed to escape Delhi during fieldwork, and also provided much needed support and laughter through my doctoral work. I would also like to thank my family here in the US: Payal Mehta, Ashwani Mehta, Archana Gupta, Mukul Gupta, Ardaman Shergill, Amandeep Parmar, and Priyanka Malhotra that have always been my tireless supporters. Jennifer Bills provided friendship, advice, and succor through my long graduate school career for which I am very grateful. When I began my degree program, I was working with Dr. Tracy McMillan, who deserves a special note of thanks for starting me off on this journey. Dr. Bjorn Sletto, my v adviser, warmly welcomed me as I changed directions during my doctoral work. Since then, his steadfast support, immense patience, exceptional scholarship, and tough critique have motivated me to think more critically and write more clearly. Dr. Sletto‘s role in my dissertation has been that of a guide, friend, teacher, and counselor, and I am exceptionally grateful for his constant and unstinting encouragement. Several other academic advisors deserve recognition for their support of my work. My entire doctoral committee provided feedback, especially Dr. Sarah Dooling, who also served as a friend and always encouraged me to think more boldly. I would also like to thank Dr. Elizabeth Mueller for stepping in at the last moment to help me in this process. Dr. Terry Kahn has been a source of encouragement from my very first semester as a PhD student, and I am extremely grateful for his constant support. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Kent Butler‘s help during this process. In Delhi, I would like to thank Dr. Renu Khosla, Nandita Gupta and the entire team of Center for Urban and Regional Excellence who shared with me their vast knowledge of Delhi‘s water supply and management systems. They introduced me to one of my research sites, and also allowed me to become a part of several of their projects. I also want to thank Shashi, fieldworker extraordinaire from CURE, who served as a guide for many weeks. Dr. Rohan D‘Souza and Deya Roy of Jawaharlal Nehru University provided academic support and friendship during fieldwork. Dunu Roy and Banajyothna Baruah of the Hazard‘s Center provided critical information and useful advice for this project. vi Special thanks must be given to the women of Kathputli Colony and Savda Ghevra who allowed me into their lives and homes, and shared with me their many stories. I was constantly amazed by their resilience and innovation in the face of hardship, and am forever indebted to them for their willingness to be a part of my work. I would also like to thank the public officials who took the time to share with me their experiences and knowledge. I am exceptionally grateful for the time, confidence, and patience of Mr. Mukul Bhandula. Financially, a number of fellowships and scholarships made this dissertation possible. A Harrington fellowship provided support for my first year of doctoral studies. The Hogg fellowship and a continuing fellowship from the University of Texas at Austin Graduate School and several other scholarships from the School of Architecture and the South Asia Institute funded my research and travel. I am exceedingly grateful for the support. Last but not least, I‘d like to thank my fellow graduate students, and now professors as may be the case, for their friendship, support, feedback, and advice. Rosie Tighe, Tommi Ferguson, Barbara Wilson, Leah Hollstein, Khaled Alwadi, Jenni Minner, Elizabeth Walsh, Sara Hammerschmidt, Kathryn Howell, Jane Winslow, Marla Torrado, Saikat Maitra, Noman Baig, Devashree Saha, Shawn Strange and Nate Laughlin all provided emotional and academic support. vii PREFACE Approximately a month after I started working in Kathputli, Nirmala ji1, a female pradhan2, asked me to accompany her and a few other women to the offices of the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) engineer working in the area, a Mr. Magne. I immediately agreed, excited that the women were asking me to join them as they navigated DJB hierarchies. At the time, I did not stop to question why the women would need me, a relative stranger to their water problems, to speak with a DJB engineer on their behalf. Later, however, I repeatedly saw women from low-income neighborhoods search for a bridge or connection to Delhi‘s water planning and policy institutions either through local political figures, NGO workers, or in this case, a resident from a higher income neighborhood who was also from America. The day before our field trip, I met with Nirmala and six other women near the community water collection point to develop a strategy. We met at 1pm, braving the humidity of July, and sat in the dusty open space near the community water collection point just underneath a busy, traffic-heavy road, occasionally interrupted by the metro train as it thundered by above us. We began making lists of questions, complaints and suggestions for the engineer, collecting all the information we would need to be prepared for the meeting next day. Other women who were collecting water periodically stopped 1 All names in the document have been changed to protect the identity of the informants. 2 Ji is an honorific to indicate respect; pradhan is the term for a community leader. viii by to ask us what we were doing and offer suggestions, or simply to chat with one of the other women. Despite the heat, we sat for two hours talking and planning. We were going to ask the engineer to procure a new water pipe for the community. The current pipe was rusty, old, damaged, covered with grime, and extremely brittle. Residents commonly called it ‗geele atte ki pipe‘ (pipe made of wet dough) or ‗chhanni‘ (sieve). The water that came through this pipe was yellow in color and sometimes had a sewage-like smell. I remember thinking, as we were sitting in the heat near the water pump, that maybe this would be the moment of where my relationship with the women from Kathputli would transform, that maybe I now would become a part of their daily activities involving water. Indeed, this trip to the office of the DJB junior engineer did become a watershed moment in my work, but not because it strengthened my relationship with the women or allowed me to immerse myself further into the community. Instead, it became the event that began to define my understanding of the pervasive gendered politics in Delhi‘s water sector. On the morning of our trip, I arrived in Kathputli at 6AM. I was early. It was going to take at least an hour to get to the DJB office and we had planned to arrive by 8.30AM. As I waited for the women to finish their morning tasks, I could see the sights and hear the sounds of a typical Kathputli morning. Women in brightly colored saris were rushing to get water, cook food, wash clothes. Children and men were performing their morning ablutions in front of their homes. Shops were opening. I could smell everything ix from food being cooked to the excrements that were accumulating in the open drains as children squatted over them. Around 7AM, the women began to congregate at our meeting spot near Nirmala ji‘s house, and we walked together to the bus stop. We missed two haphazardly moving buses that didn‘t ever come to a complete stop, but finally at 7.30 AM, we managed to get on a bus. As we stood in the front of the crowded vehicle, Nirmala ji warned me, ―Get out quickly when I tell you, the driver only slows down near the stop.‖ In response, the bus conductor, standing right beside us, laughed and said, ―we‘ll stop…you haven‘t ever gotten off a moving bus, have you?‖ My ―no‖ was very amusing to all the women and to the bus conductor. This was the first instance, among many during the day and during my fieldwork, that made me acknowledge how differently women from Kathputli and I interacted with city spaces. This became even clearer as we reached the engineer‘s office.
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