The Making of the 'Local': the Everyday Politics of Mitra Mandals on the Margins of the City Radhika Raj Introduction Severa

The Making of the ‘Local’: The Everyday Politics of Mitra Mandals on the Margins of the City

Radhika Raj

Introduction

Several have lamented the fall of Mumbai‟s cosmopolitan and plural culture after the rise of the regionalist, right-wing politics of Shiv Sena. When Shiv Sena was founded in 1966, it stormed into the people‟s consciousness through its openly provocative call to the „Marathi Manoos‟ to stand up against the “alien” south Indians for allegedly stealing jobs from the original inhabitants of the city. In the Marathi newspaper Marmik, Bal Thackeray, founder and chief of Shiv Sena, published a list of flourishing South Indian businesses and eateries with a headline „Vachaa Aani, Shanth Basaa‟ (Read This, And Sit Quiet). He also coined the slogan 'uthao lungi aur bajao pungi‟ pushing young Maharashtrian men to fight back for what, he believed, was rightfully theirs. A series of attacks on Udipi restaurants followed. By 1970s, Thackeray had turned his attention to the Left mill workers movement, the dalit movement and Muslims in Mumbai, naming suburbs with greater Muslim residents, Pakistan.

The anti-Muslim, Bombay riots of 1992-93, orchestrated by the Shiv Sena, irredeemably altered the social fabric of the city. Over two months, the city saw violent rioting followed by a mass exodus of Muslims and non-Maharashtrians. According to records, over 900 were killed and 2,00,000 abandoned the city for a safer refuge (Lele 1995). While the city suffered, the most gruesome episodes of violence were reported within informal settlements. Patel argues that Sena‟s Hindutva politics first built a stronghold within working class communities in the 1970s, when there was an acute shortage for housing and jobs amongst the poor. Sena‟s footsoldiers were young, Hindu men who not only forwarded the party‟s agenda but fashioned themselves as self-proclaimed guardians of working class neighbourhoods. It is in this backdrop of extreme spatial stress that the city‟s geography was reinscribed by the Shiv Sena as a Hindu space that framed the Muslim other as the encroacher (Appadurai 2000).

In 1995, following the riots Shiv Sena won its first municipal elections and came to power. By early 2000s, Thackeray had started targeting the „bhaiyya‟ for allegedly stealing jobs that rightfully belonged to the Marathi Manoos, a term that he derogatorily used for describing North Indian migrants. North Indian taxi drivers were pulled out of their vehicles and beaten, a few of their cars were set on fire. In 2003, the Shiv Sena ransacked a railway recruitment office, claiming that 90 per cent of the successful candidates in railway exams were from Bihar. The exams had to be postponed.

Extensive research on migration, migrants and the city has focused on the various vulnerabilities and violences faced by those who seek employment and refuge in urban centres, and how this in turn influences and shapes the city itself. However, these binary categories of the „local‟ and the „migrant‟ are rarely questioned. This paper argues that the binary is deliberately produced and mobilised to advance political agendas and is influenced by class, caste, religion and regional biases. Who is a „migrant‟ and who can claim to be a „local‟, and in turn demand rights to the city, is a political, strategic exercise.

In the city of Mumbai, Shiv Sena regionalist politics has been central to defining who is a „local‟ and who is a „migrant‟. Gyan Prakash (2010, p232) argues that “no socio-economic reality, no cultural tradition, sufficiently explains the emergence of the Marathi manoos. It was Thackeray‟s political creation. He referred to the injustices, real or imagined, suffered by Marathi speakers in order to constitute them as the only legitimate “people”.” Hence, it did not matter if his allegations of “outsiders” stealing local jobs were based on factual evidence. Thackeray‟s intention was not to redress these problems – over the years, Shiv Sena has done very little to resolve the unemployment in the city barring a few tokenistic employment drives. Instead, he called Shiv Sena a movement, not a political party, for the “sons of the soil”, that was anti-politics and politicians and intended to fight for the right of the original inhabitant of the city. Through his speeches and spectacular celebrations of Hindu festivals, Thackeray created a „universal political subject‟ with a homogeneous narrative of a new ethnic identity (Prakash 2010). This paper unpacks and interrogates these produced categories, by studying sites of community organisation and the role of sport, religion, local social service, in fostering this sense of „local‟ at the level of a neighbourhood. Instead of focusing on the „migrant‟, it turns the lens to „local‟ to understand how „localness‟ is understood, packaged and sold as a productive, natural identity.

Today, about 49% of Mumbai‟s population lives in slums, where people are forced to carve out life strategies in the face of state neglect, threat of evictions and market-friendly policies that limit possibilities for resistance and negotiation (Bhide 2017). These vulnerable informal settlements, mostly populated by religious minorities, dalits, migrants, are battlegrounds for mobilisations with conflicting interests. One route of mobilising is presented by right-wing organisations called the „mitra mandals‟ (friends‟ associations) that organise Hindu public festivals and sports events in working-class neighbourhoods. Mitra mandals are all-male associations, often sponsored by the xenophobic political party, Shiv Sena that propagates an aggressive brand of regional nationalism. Membership to the mandal requires a commitment to the party‟s ideals, and an embodiment of the party‟s jingoistic, hyper-masculine principles. Central to its politics is its fight against the encroachment of the „migrant other‟ on the city‟s limited informal housing and livelihood opportunities.

Based on year-long ethnographic fieldwork in a slum that was the site of one of India‟s largest Hindu-Muslim riots, the paper presents a thick description of the collective life of one such mitra mandal. Through the mandal, young men establish themselves as self-styled guardians of the neighbourhood and decide who can and cannot live or lay claims to the locality. Their sense of pride and belonging comes from defining themselves as original „sons of the soil‟, and purpose, from their fight to safeguard their claims to city and culture against the Muslim and North Indian „other‟. These spaces, events, and institutions are keys to understanding how these categories operate in everyday life. While participation in such religious, nationalist movements may provide young men an escape from everyday feelings of marginalisation, they seriously diminish possibilities of collective public action and justice that is inclusive.

The Politics of Belonging Politics of belonging is not the same as „belonging‟ itself. Crafting ways to belong, for instance, constructing legal/illegal homes in an alien city can be read as a radical exercise of claim making for those excluded from formal the processes of housing. Urban ethnographers, theorising the city from the Global South, have argued that this seemingly peripheral, everyday politics of place-making is central to city-building. The politics of belonging instead, as Yuval-Davis has argued, comprises of “specific political projects aimed at constructing belonging to particular collectivities which are themselves being constructed in very specific ways and in very specific boundaries” (Yuval-Davis, 2011,10). The legibility of these boundaries is key to its success -- how clearly can „one‟ distinguish oneself from the „other‟.

Hansen (2001, p12) in his study of identity politics and Shiv Sena in Mumbai, argues that these seemingly rigid identity-based collectivities are never stable. The definitions and boundaries of these collectivities struggle and shift with changing socio-political contexts. “There are always multiple meanings, many narratives, and inherent instabilities within such entities. One can say that the rigidity of the designator ultimately is impossible or that the name never can become completely „proper.‟” Belonging, therefore, is a dynamic process that defies the fixity that most political projects accord it. Furthermore, different projects can construct the same collectivity in different ways and people can claim to be a part of multiple, sometimes opposing, collectivities at the same time (Yuval-Davis, 2005,10). For instance, many of the first Shiv Sainiks were men from the communist movement -- the very movement the Shiv Sena aimed to dismantle. In the 70s it was common for mill workers to support both Thackeray (leader of right-wing party Shiv Sena) and Samant (leader of left movement for mill workers) (Adarkar and Menon 2004).

However, it is this very instability that the political projects strive to contain and fix in clear, immutable binaries of local/migrant, Marathi Manoos/North Indian. Who defines these boundaries and designates meaning to these collectivities remains a question of anthropological enquiry. Power structures that establish dominant ideas, treat these as „natural‟, as ever-existing, with references to a faraway (sometimes mythical) pasts.

Hence, the efficacy of these political projects depends not just on building solidarities but also on investing heavily in repetitive (often spectacular) performances that try to fix boundaries and generate collective moods and memories. Following Butler, theorists have argued that identity and belonging is a performative accomplishment. Shiv Sena‟s political movement was constantly fuelled by conspiracies of the “outsider” – how south Indians steal jobs, how Muslims burst crackers every time Pakistan wins a cricket match or how Biharis top railway exams held in Mumbai -- but it was also bolstered with violent performances of riots, of public religious festivities, staged processions and protests. It is these cultural performances that produce passions that contribute significantly to the construction of communities as political actors Das (xx).

Hansen (2002) in his work on the Shiv Sena has insisted that public festivities “…are generative political moments par excellence, the heart of political society, and the sites where historical imaginaries, the state and notions of community and „society‟ become visible and effective.” He further argues that Shiv Sena has perfected tricks of generating passionate public moods, which has enabled its success in the absence of a clear ideology. Over the years, the politics of Hindu nationalism has played out as much in the public sphere as religious destinations or electoral offices. It has played out in what Appadurai, Hansen, Verkaaik et al have termed as „public culture‟ – “the public space in which a society and communities imagine, represent and recognise themselves through political discourse.” (Hansen 1999, 4) These public spaces are masculine spheres of discourse and performance.

Herzfeld, while talking of manhood, argues that there is more stress on how rather than what men do -- what counts is “performative excellence.” Hence, masculinity is acquired, verified and played out in the “brave deed”, “risk taking” and “expression of fearlessness” (Peteet 1994). Abu-Lughod uses honour as a defining frame for masculinity. “Real men” are able to exact respect and command obedience from others while they themselves resist submitting to others‟ control. ”Like honour, with which it is inextricably bound, manhood is easily lost if one if not vigilant about its display and protection.” Hence, displays of masculinity constantly need an audience which is this case is found in the public sphere – within the peer group, the street corner, during festivals. Furthermore, public institutions have had exclusively male membership and tend to operate according to patriarchal ideologies. Gender power works through civic associations, local clubs, political parties that shape the neighbourhoods on similar ideologies.

Finally, I argue that place is closely tied to the politics of belonging. Identities are tied to a territory, either physical, or as diaspora studies have argued an imagination of a territory. [INCOMPLETE]

In study the politics of belonging in three sites: 1) The mitra mandal as organisation 2) The informal settlement site of the mitra mandal 3) The city on the day of the festivities

The Organisation Mitra mandals are a common, yet under-studied part of Mumbai‟s popular culture. They are Hindu all-male community associations found largely in working-class neighbourhoods and are known for community service and the celebration of public festivals. Most, though not all, run on the political patronage of the regional right-wing party, Shiv Sena. While there are no rules that govern what makes a mandal; many are attached to a temple and a gymnasium or a maidan, but some are merely rooms where men gather to play cards or chit-chat. What sets these mandals apart from Shiv Sena shakhas (party offices) or Hindu militant outfits such as Bajrang Dal is that they are primarily seen as spaces of leisure where young men meet, interact, celebrate and organise public festivals or play sports.

These mandals are central to Shiv Sena‟s local base. It is through these mandals that young men in working class localities are recruited within the political movement. Most men are attracted to these mandals because they offer opportunities of recreation, celebration and leisure. These are also spaces where a neighbourhood collectivity around a common religious tradition are forged.

The existence of similar all-male neighbourhood associations can be traced back to the emergence of textile mills in Bombay in the late 19th century. The industrialisation of the metropolis attracted scores of migrants to the heart of the city that soon came to be known as Girangaon or mill village. By 1921, over 80 per cent of Mumbai‟s population consisted of migrants. Jobs in the mills were mostly of a very insecure nature – workers, largely single- migrant men, were hired on a daily basis from a pool by „jobbers‟. They worked long hours and lived in crammed one-room tenements with shared facilities called chawls – sometimes as many as 30 used a single chawl room in shifts to rest (Chandavarkar 1994, 108). These associations were also central to the social networks that workers invested in and depended on in a new city.

Chandavarkar documents two types of neighbourhood associations that served as spaces of leisure for the mill workers – melas and akhadas or gymnasiums. Melas were involved in the celebration of public festivals such as Ganeshutsav and Gokulashtamai; while akhadas or gymnasiums contributed to the physical culture of the mill district. In gymnasiums and akhadas men were trained in fighting and using lathis and were tapped by politicians and trade union leaders when they needed physical force on their side or were employed by the mill owners to forcibly, violently break a strike (Chandavarkar 1994). Hence, they nurtured a masculine culture of bravado and strength. They were also led by prominent men of the neighbourhood or „dadas‟ -- a charismatic authority figure within working class societies who ruled these associations (and by extension the neighbourhood) through a paradox of generous benevolence and the threat of violence (Patel 1996, Hansen 2001). It is for these reasons that the associations were often seen by more „respectable‟ leaders as arenas of the mavali or the street hooligan.

Despite this, prominent politicians often attended key events. The local power the associations wielded made it very difficult to ignore them. During festivals such as Dahi Handi and Ganeshutsav, they turned into spaces where local patrons could gives speeches, ask for support and compete for influence and public standing. It is in these spaces, that leisure was inseparably tied to politics (Hansen 2002, 73). Even today, mitra mandals are associations through which politicians and state leaders develop cultural and intimate relations with their subjects through patronage (Herzfeld)

Bal Thackeray was effectively able to influence this cultural milieu. Chandavarkar (2004) claims that Sena‟s power grew by capturing the same neighbourhood associations that were once bastions of the Left in the 1930s and 40s. The mitra mandals and gymnasiums played a big role in the first rally organised by the Shiv Sena – members of the party conducted meetings with most akhadas in the central districts and registered a joint mandal with all the Dahi Handi groups in the city. Most of the mandals turned up for the rally held at Shivaji Park that was crowded with over 2 lakhs people (Purandare 2012). “There was a reason why the vyayamshalas were selected for recruitment: the Party said it wanted strong and brave men. This attracted the youth of the vyayamshalas who prided themselves on their physique and their manhood. Now look at me, I am neither strong nor big. But I felt strong in such an organisation.” Interview of door-to-door salesman (Adarkar and Menon 2004)

Kaur (2003) gives a rough estimate of at least 74,000 Ganeshutsav mandals that are involved in celebrating the festival, of which at least 70 per cent are either run or are supported by the Shiv Sena. This dense network of political party offices and various community mandals forms Shiv Sena‟s real strength. Heuze (1995) roughly estimates about 5000 such mitra mandals in the 90s when Sena‟s power was the strongest; as opposed to about only 200 shakhas or party offices. The mandals were 25-times the shakhas, clearly indicating that the strength in numbers came from the loosely associated mandals. The network of the mandals today forms what Appadurai calls the „nervous system‟ of Mumbai (Appadurai 2000, Hansen 2005).

The Mandal and the Neighborhood Eckert goes as far as to argue that it is through the combination of the mandal and the Shiv Sena shakha that a Hindu neighbourhood is produced in Mumbai (Eckert 2000). “The clubs are perhaps primarily places where all the things that are perpetually at stake outside – status, employment, the daily struggle – are largely dedramatised” (Heuze 1995). The Shiv Sena mitra mandals also go a step ahead of akhadas and melas by incorporating „seva‟ or social work within their repertoire. Shiv Sena claims that it is „committed to 80% social service and 20% politics‟ but to serve the people, the Sena claims it needs “power”. However, the definition of „social worker‟ is fairly wide and flexible. Social workers are seen as benevolent guardians or dadas of informal neighbourhoods and are known to provide access to basic services, facilitate school and college admission processes etc. Hence, the mandals that focus on festivities, sports and seva do not have an overtly political message.

Kaur (2003) notes that Ganeshutsav mandals foreground the religious festivities as opposed to party propaganda, however the party symbols such as saffron flags are on grand display. It is precisely because these activities are not explicitly centered on the political message, they are even more effective (Eckert 2001). Since they are couched in the discourse of „Hindu culture‟ as opposed to „Hindutva politics‟, they seamlessly become a part of everyday practice and “percolate into the common sense of the people” (Fuller 2001, 134). The reason the mandals thrive is because it functions on, what Kaur calls “the hegemony of commensensical politics”:“... that is, a state of circumstances where agendas and issues do not even have to be conspicuously articulated in order for them to be understood.” (Kaur 2004, 57) Social work, patriotism, blood-donation drives, celebration of festivities, sport are easily, unquestioningly accepted and welcomed into the neighbourhood.

Every slum has 50 to 100 mitra mandals and the city must easily have over 1 lakhs mitra mandals today. Mitra mandals need to be registered with the state‟s Charity Commissioner but the procedure requires legal documentation and clear ownership titles of the office. Slum residents rarely have legal land ownership. Hence, at least 90 per cent of these mandals are unregistered mandals. If I have 25 boys standing with me, I can start a mandal. You can make a politician the President even if he turns up once in a year. This helps you build networks with the political party and assures the politicians of at least 25 votes. Several men are a part of more than one mandal in order to expand and strengthen their network. This network is a sign of your power in the neighborhood. I know somebody who leads five! (Interview with a mitra mandal member, August 17, 2015)

The Shakha and mandal thus create mutual obligations or what Herzfeld has called „cultural intimacy‟ among the party and the people (Herzfeld).

There was an old wall in our zopadpatti that had turned into a garbage dump and a place for men to pee. One Sunday, my friends and I collected Rs 50 from the residents; white washed the wall and asked the children of the locality to paint on it. The response was so great that by the end of the day children were demanding a new wall to paint on. When my friends and I came home that night we decided to start a mandal to keep these community activities going. A very impressed Shiv Sena politician decided to support us. The Ashok Samrat Mitra Mandal was born that night. (Interview with a mitra mandal member, September 23, 2015)

The mitra mandal is Shiv Sena‟s local dimension that facilitates its entry into the neighbourhood. More importantly, it allows for the social appropriation of urban space. For two decades – 1990 to 2010 -- the party developed the most “intensive and authentic relationships” with the slum population (Heuze 2011).

Through celebrations, social service and sports the making of successful mandals involves making territorial claims based on ethnic identities that naturally reproduce criterias of exclusion (Eckert 2001). A neighborhood within a slum is known by its mandal and the group of young men who control it. The rivalry between mandals often turns into rivalry between neighborhoods. During fieldwork, sports competitions were held amongst mandals of a locality. Most mitra mandals had names inspired by warrior kings, Hindu gods and Hindu nationalist movements such as Buland Jawan (Hail the Soldier) Mitra Mandal, Ran Zunzhar (Fearless Warrior) Mitra Mandal, Vande Mataram Mitra Mandal and Ashok Samrat Mitra Mandal. Today the Sena is “inconceivable without its mandal-like relationship with the local environment” (Heuze 2011). ‘We were very tired of simply hanging out, we wanted to feel like we were worth something’ Rakesh Sawant, 30

My school years had just ended and I had started going to college – “Enjoy ashi life hoti” (Life was all about enjoyment). When I was in Class 11-12, we had group of young men, we used to hang out in Shyam Nagar talao. We used to come back from college, freshen up and meet there. We must have been at least 10 to 15 boys -- every popular boy from Jogeshwari used to be at that spot. We had no „kaam-dhanda‟ (work) but still people knew us because we were also very good kabbadi players and that had made us famous. When we met we had conversations over endless cups of chai. We were very attached to each other -- if anybody was in trouble at any point we would be there for that person. If somebody had Ganpati festival at his place we would be at his place for those entire 11 days helping out the family with the celebrations. The police knew us well by then -- we never teased girls (ched-chad) or got into a brawl (maara-maari).

One evening, suddenly a boy came running towards us yelling “Jeev Dilla. Jeev Dilla” (Killed herself! Killed herself!) I quickly looked at my mitra-mandali (friends), and I knew one guy could swim. I told him „Arre, jump-na yaar!‟ A police constable also came running towards the talao but he did not want to get his uniform dirty! One of us was a good swimmer and I had started swimming recently but I had never taken such a big risk and the woman was a „fatty‟. Finally we took off our shoes, wallets and jumped straight into the water. My friend caught hold of the woman‟s hair and I found a piece of her dress, and we pulled that out bit by bit. A three-star police officer who happened to pass by asked, “Who are those boys?” He asked the constable to write all our names down. We asked him if we‟d done something wrong but he said he wanted to nominate us for a bravery award! We told him that we just wanted permission to sit by the talao and that was enough. He then went to the local chai wala – we had credit with him -- asked him to feed all of us and cancel all our credit! That is the first time we felt like we are worth something. So then we decide to start the Govinda Pathak. Almost all boys joined the mandal. Soon more friends started asking where I was going and then they joined me. Earlier in my area nobody was as interested in Dahi Handi. Now everybody knows and if they see me loitering around the area during the Handi season they will come scold me, „Why haven‟t you gone for practice yet?!‟

Kings of the Suburbs This research locates itself within one such mitra mandal called Buland Jawan (Hail the Soldier) that led these mobilisations. Over the last decade, Buland Jawan has gained enormous popularity for participating in the sporting festival of Dahi Handi. Today, the 300- odd men of the mandal call themselves „Kings of the Suburbs‟ and take immense pride in the fact that they are one of only three mandals in the city that builds a nine-tier human pyramid.

At least 800 to 1000 of these mandals participate in the celebration of the highly competitive sporting festival of Dahi Handi. In today‟s day and age, the human pyramid is a precarious formation. It takes about hundreds of men of a certain height, certain weight and of certain reckless courage to build a 45-feet, nine-tier tower with no safety gear. With rising heights, there have been several petitions by „activists‟ to put a cap on the number of tiers, citing growing injuries and deaths. One death and 290 injuries were reported in 2014; whereas two deaths and 625 injuries in 2013. There have also been demands of ban on the festival that many claim is a „traffic nuisance‟ and cause for „sound pollution‟, among other things. However, the prize money offered by politicians for building tallest pyramid continues to make headlines. Hence, despite opposition the festival has only grown larger and the pyramids, taller.

In the year 2012, the Buland Jawan Mitra Mandal bagged the Guinness World Record for building the highest human pyramid (49.79 feet) documented in the world, beating Spain‟s record of 39.12 feet. (A similar sport of building human pyramids is also celebrated in Chile and Spain). Since then, the men claim that they not only represent their suburb but Hindu culture and India at an international level. The members unfurl the Indian flag along with a saffron flag after every victory and insist they do no longer play the local „Dahi‟ Handi, but „Global‟ Handi. Over the past few years they have raked in much as Rs 25 lakhs in day in prize money. In 2000, when Buland Jawan was first launched there were only three mandals within the slum it is located in. However, since its success the number of mandals has risen to a shocking 43.

The site: The field site is located in an informal settlement in Jogeshwari at about two kilometres east of the railway station. The settlement has grown on and around a hillock and is commonly known as Shiv Tekdi (Shiv after the Hindu warrior king Shivaji and Tekdi means a hillock). The Buland Jawan Mitra Mandal („Hail the Soldier‟ Friends‟ Association) is a combination of a playground and a temple that sits on the top of a hill covered with dense informal settlements, stacked above each other. As the night settles down and residents recede into their homes, the mandal comes alive. Men returning late from work have dinner, throw on blue jerseys and head barefoot in raucous groups through dark lanes for practice.

Two adjacent sites make the Buland Jawan Mitra Mandal. It is known by its soft, red-earth maidan and an attached Hanuman mandir (temple) that houses a men‟s gymnasium. Besides the idol of the Monkey God, the temple has floor-to-ceiling shelves that showcase glittering trophies Buland Jawan has won over the decade. The gymnasium, with shiny new equipment, has life-size photographs of some of Buland Jawan‟s most successful pyramids. The wall on the other end of the maidan has an overbearing portrait of the regional warrior king Shivaji. Between these highly revered, Hindu masculine icons, the men of the mandal swear to everlasting brotherhood or bhavki before every practice. There is also a 100-square-feet room that doubles as the mandal‟s office and a store room but is used rarely since most meetings are held in the temple with Lord Hanuman as witness.

The dizzy heights that Buland Jawan has achieved over the last decade, are techniques the men have developed through multiple attempts of trying varied combinations on a ground within an informal settlement that is so crammed, that if the pyramid does not collapse right, a man flung outside the formation could rip his body on one of the sharp asbestos roofs that jut out at odd angles.

The history of the settlement goes back to the 1950s when the Mumbai City Municipal Government acquired a piece of forest land to resettle populations displaced by projects within the main city. Each locality bears the name of the original site from where the population was relocated such as Bandra Plot or Colaba Plot (Kothari and Contractor 1996). The forest land around the localities was eventually encroached upon to meet the growing demand for housing.

Oral narratives have shown that the chawls were/are owned by North Indians and Muslims, whereas the majority population was largely Maharashtrian Hindus. For instance, the Buland Jawan Mitra Mandal is located in a chawl called Sitaram Wadi, owned by a North Indian landlord. None of the residents own the land they have settled in; instead pay the landlord monthly rent, yet believe that they are rightful owners. The first settlers in Sitaram Wadi were mill workers who had migrated to Mumbai to find jobs in the textile mills, but were eventually were rendered jobless due to the closure of mills.

The settlement also has the recently constructed Jogeshwari Vikroli Link Road on one end, and large, gated complexes on the other. Sandwiched between these two representations of a new imagination of Mumbai, lies this vast informal settlement. At walking distance are caves that house Jogeshwari Mata, the goddess after whom the suburb is said to be named. The area was a stronghold of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) till the late 1960s. However, after the 1970s, Shiv Sena1 has consistently won local elections here. The fact that Thackeray owns a home across the Jogeshwari Vikroli Link Road (JVLR) is a major influencer.

The settlement was also at the centre of the 1992-93 Hindu-Muslim Bombay riots. The Radhabai Chawl episode is known to have fuelled several attacks on Muslims across the city which were seen as „spontaneous‟ or in „reaction to‟ it (Menon 2012). After the riots, heterogeneous communities were neatly divided between Hindu areas and Muslim areas. A part of the area also housed several other Hindu families who left Muslim neighbourhood from across the city to live among „familiar‟ people of the same religion. However, one of the more permanent changes that were seen within the settlement was an imaginary but rigid „border‟ between the two communities that cut the settlement into unequal halves – Muslims are known to stay on one side of the border, Hindus on the other. The YUVA study reveals that ward boundaries were redrawn based on the changes of the demographic profile of the area. Today, the Muslim pocket is demarcated as a separate ward from the Hindu wards. Through the redrawing of ward boundaries the ghettoisation was further legitimised by the state (Kothari and Contractor 1996). Shiv Sena has consistently won elections in the area

1 Shiv Sena or literally Shivaji’s Army is named after the 17th century Hindu warrior-king Shivaji Maharaj who is known for his resistance to the Moghuls. Since the 1980s, the party has been known for asserting the rights of the local Maharashtrians and promoting Hindutva while stigmatizing the Muslim minority. since 1992. The local corporator who now remains the MLA was named under several cases as a part of the Sri Krishna Report.

For the men, the riots irrevocably stigmatised Jogeshwari.

Mandal member: We have all studied in municipality schools -- nobody is well educated here. We had no godfather growing up, we had no guidance. Most importantly we had no godfather – nobody to look after the area, start schools, education classes, nobody came to teach us anything, to tell us right from wrong. Most of our parents were busy making ends meet – our fathers were mill workers who had lost jobs and now did odd jobs here and there and our mothers were house maids. We were left behind because we had poor education. The riots ruined everything, it took away any little opportunity we had. No banks would give credit cards or loans to those living in Jogeshwari after the riots!

Wacquant (2014) while talking of ghettos in Central America he argues that “spatial taint” does not manifest simply in the visible and tangible poor state attention, degraded housing, lack of access to basic services and crime. It also manifests in how residents absorb and feel the discredit and how they contest the sense of shame tied to place. “For months after the riots, people travelling on the local trains would shut the bogey doors at Jogeshwari so nobody would enter the compartment. Once or twice fights broke out on the station -- Jogeshwari‟s name was so bad.” The men linked defiling of their honour closely to the locality. The “dishonouring” of Hindus during the riots is closely tied to dishonouring of Jogeshwari Mata and the men of Buland Jawan see themselves as soldiers on a mission to regain this lost honour. “When I started Buland Jawan I simply wanted to do something because I was free, but over the years we have managed to erase the daag (stain) that the riots left on Jogeshwari,” said a member. “Now Jogeshwari no longer stands for riots, it stands for Buland Jawan.”

Political Performances: On the day of the festival all the embodied emotions coalesce in a precarious, unstable mammoth pyramid of communal power. The members of mandals wear t-shirts with photographs of right-wing political patrons and religious symbols. Pyramids are built in the backdrop of equally large cut-outs of male leaders. The pyramid turns into a political device and tool (Blom Hansen 2001). Big men who dole out bundles of cash to the winners, refashion themselves as benevolent patrons and protectors of the Hindu culture. The male bodies, stacked in tiers in the pyramid, turn into surfaces to sharpen communal boundaries.

The state and the festival have had a long standing tussle over age limit of the children and the risk men put themselves at and rising number of injuries. In 2015, the following restrictions were announced on the celebration of the festival: 1) The Dahi Handi Tower will not exceed 20 feet. 2) The stage will not occupy more than 30 feet of the road. 3) Restrictions were also applicable on the decibel levels. However, there was great speculation that this was a politically motivated act. Many said that the newly elected government of Bhartiya Janata Party at the Maharashtra State Level wanted inroads into the festival that was now controlled by Shiv Sena and other opposition political parties. Most of these tableaus were organized in political strongholds, on the streets. The restriction on the height of the stage on the streets was a way to unsettle these celebrations. Soon enough, one of the biggest organisers and a member of an opposition party pulled out of the festival. A few others followed suit. The State appointed a committee headed by a BJP MLA to put together the new guidelines for the festival.

In 2015, for the first time BJP ruled the Dahi Handi celebrations by successfully taking them off the city‟s streets and organising them within hired playgrounds and stadiums. BJP organised a shocking 150 Dahi Handis 2within the city, where iconography that earlier showcased Shiv Sena leaders was now replaced by life-size cut-outs of the current Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

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