Now, it's the turn of "slum tourism" in India

By Satish G. | eTN Asia 
Some call it "slum tours." A section puts it as "poorism" for travel enthusiasts. Whatever term may be used for this new form of tourism, tourists roaming around streets of Delhi, experiencing the life of poor, especially underprivileged children, understanding their plight, how they earn their livelihood is all gaining in popularity over the last few months.

As per the information available, in Delhi, former street dwellers take the tourists from the New Delhi Railway Station platform through makeshift homes under footbridges to explain how the children live, what they do for a living and where they sleep.
 
CNN-IBN reported: "If you are tired of Mughal architecture and the sprawling Lutyens' Bungalow Zone then the living horrors of nearly 2,000 street children in Delhi could be a new travel offer. Wading through the bylanes of Paharganj, `poorism' for travel enthusiasts takes one into real India and is being popularly described as Slum Tourism. The New Delhi Railway Station has been home and refuge for four-year-old Mahadiyah and his companions for the longest time they can remember."
 
The tour is priced at US$4.5 a ticket and spans over two hours. Those, who organize such tours, claim that the tours are not undertaken to showcase poverty but sensitize and create awareness about the way of life here.
 
According to news agency PTI, in Delhi, these slum tours started in April this year, and are already attracting lot of western and Indian travelers. "Conducted by the Salam Balak Trust, an NGO here, their guide, Javed, a former slum dweller, who says he himself lived on the railway station for seven years, takes these visitors around the New Delhi Railway Station, the slums behind it, the rag pickers who separate the plastics and other waste collected from the station," it reported.
 
Some have even taken objection to this. As per the information available, social activists are up against these slum tours and say it is voyeurism at its worst. Javed Abidi, a disabled rights activist, says, "The children or the slum dwellers no way benefit from this. Celebrities and foreign dignitaries make it a point to visit slums, street children and girls' homes. Children are lined up for photo-ops and it just ends there… there is no accountability after that."

June 28, 2006   Posted in: India