A Demolition, and the tragic death of Billo Rani's kittens

When the demolition notice arrived, more than a hundred residents of the New Delhi slums of Batla House were still coping with the effects of the Covid-19-induced lockdown. The residents of this slum area, like majority of Indians, worked in the unorganised sector — the men were daily wage labourers and the women domestic servants in nearby flats.

There was more to these flats than just air conditioning, puccha architecture, and reliable 9–5 jobs. The fact that "they didn’t live in continual fear of their homes being demolished," in the words of a domestic servant who worked in one of them, was the best thing.

The year of COVID-19, 2020, was harsh for the slum dwellers. No one was employed. There were no wages.

Sometimes not even the most basic of meals would be served on the table. When I heard about this demolition drive two years back, my first thought was that winter was going to start soon. Where will the residents go?

For a few days now, my mind has been battling with the sight of helpless people scattered around their demolished homes, children crying in pain, and the hiss of their breaths.

Bulldozing is not just knocking out materialistic four-sided walls, but a lot more.

The idea of demolition could mean different things to different people. Whenever I hear the word "demolition," which is a lot these days, I am reminded of Anisha. For her, the demolition of the house she lived in, a slum, also meant the loss of 5 of her kittens.

Among all the things Anisha lost in the demolition, the loss of her kittens was the most upsetting. She called it the "tragic death of Billo Rani's kittens." It was heartbreaking.

She had a small, used refrigerator that managed to keep water cold enough during the summer, as well as schoolbooks and notebooks in which she was still practising the alphabet. All this was gone.

The slum cluster's residents claimed that their dwellings were bulldozed without warning or sufficient time for them to remove their possessions.

Around 100 families lost their homes when their slums in New Delhi's Dhobi Ghat neighbourhood were razed in September 2020. Many families lost their houses due to the Delhi Development Authority's demolition campaign and were forced to move to the streets.

Billo Rani was saved from close to her home about a year ago by Anisha, a ten-year-old student in the fourth grade at a neighbouring government school.

She observed the cat's colourful black and white skin getting soiled in the mud water that had accumulated close to the slum neighbourhood. Still, she thought to herself of the cat covered in mud and dirt: she was the ultimate pet.

She grabbed her up and carried her inside her over-35-square-foot slum of a home. Anisha claims that she struggled to persuade her parents, but they finally gave in when she "threw a fit."

She described Billo Rani's kittens to me as being extremely little when they were born. They had not yet opened their eyes when they died.

"They were unfortunate to be born into such a harsh planet. Why should animals suffer as a result of anyone's fault? Our slum is gone, and our neighbourhood has been destroyed," Anisha told me.

The inhabitants were aware for several months that their slums would eventually be demolished.

"Because we live on their lands, we are a burden to them [the government]. Unauthorized calls are made to our houses. How are we living? Is our existence also unapproved for them to simply uproot it whenever they please?" an elderly man asked me.

Finally, on the day of the demolition, the slum dwellers knew their time was up when they heard the bulldozer's deafening noise in the morning. Anisha, her mother, and her sister were frightened. They then stood up and left the shanty. Her father had left the house earlier to look for work.

Before they even had a chance to comprehend what was occurring, the bulldozer had begun tearing down houses. There was debris and turmoil everywhere.

Anisha wasn’t used to having five kittens with her, and she didn’t realise they were inside until just a few seconds before the demolition. She begged, "Ruk jaiye, meri billiyan so rahi hain andar." My kittens are napping, she requested.

Her voice couldn’t be heard over the noise of the Bulldozer. The slum was destroyed. A few hours later, when Anisha went to look for her kittens inside the debris, she was half anticipating that they would be meowing somewhere beneath the debris, that some miracle would have rescued the cats even though tonnes of material had probably fallen on them.

Anisha spotted the kittens after a few hours of looking. She said that one of the kittens surprised her by being alive. Under the rubble, she was having a hard time breathing. She exhaled in relief when she was finally removed.

However, that kitten also passed away after a few days. Trauma, she suspected. Anisha was relieved because the kitten was extremely in pain, fighting for her life.

Do you have a photo of her? I asked.

Anisha pulled out her mother's mobile phone and handed it to me, saying, "Yes, but I'll only show you a happy image of her, not the one where she's dead."

In the picture, Anisha is holding one of the kittens in her hands while surrounded on her sides by her sister and a friend. A black and white striped cat. Her eyes closed. Anisha, her sister, and her friend are all grinning. It was taken a few days before the demolition. In the picture, they all appear to be unaware of the tragedy that would occur in a few days.

Anisha then sat in the cardboard and plastic-made temporary slum with her mother. "Our lives are unimportant to them [referring to the government]," said Anisha's mother.

"We are merely slum residents who provide them no advantages. Our only friends are our goats, chickens, and kittens," she added.

Meanwhile, Billo Rani softly climbed onto Anisha’s lap. Closed her eyes. As if in solidarity with her.

After all, both had lost possessions they cherished dearly.

Anisha, her home, and Billo Rani, her kittens.