No Dalits, Muslims please: Study shows rampant discrimination against tenants in NCR

If you are a Dalit or a Muslim, finding a home in NCR can be way more difficult than say, if you belonged to an upper Hindu caste. The data collected from a study on discrimination in urban housing rental preferences, shows that 18 per cent of Dalits and 31 per cent of Muslims faced outright rejection when they called upper class Hindu households on the telephone to inquire about a home. Not one high caste home-seeker faced a similar rejection, reports the Indian Express . [caption id=“attachment_2211266” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters[/caption] In face-to-face conversation with the home owners, the odds of being rejected rose even higher for the two communities. 44 per cent of Dalits and 61 per cent of Muslims faced rejection. 97 percent of upper-caste Hindus received a positive response. The study is to be published in a forthcoming issue of Economic and Political Weekly. The study, conducted by Prof S K Thorat, chairman of the Indian Council of Social Science Research and scholars Anuradha Banerjee, Vinod K Mishra and Firdaus Rizvi, covered attempts to get houses on rent in Delhi, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, Gurgaon and Noida between January and March 2012. Another investigation from the Hindu in 2012, where reports posed as Muslims seeking homes, shows a similar trend in some of the most affluent neighbourhoods of Delhi. But the problem is not restricted to NCR, as another  Hindu article points out, even in Mumbai, since the 1992-93 communal riots, discrimination remains entrenched and unchecked. Communities such as Dalits also encounter biases when they seek housing, but Muslims are an “easy target” because their names often point to their identity. The issue came into limelight this past May , when Misbah Quadri, a young girl who was refused an apartment in Mumbai allegedly because she was Muslim. “The broker asked for a No-Objections Certificate saying that I can’t hold anyone responsible in case I face harassment for being a Muslim in the building,” she said. “This is not the first time I faced this issue. I’ve been in Mumbai for five and a half years. Sometimes, brokers didn’t even show me houses.” The legal aspect remains murky. Although it is illegal to deny anyone a place in public housing based on their religion or caste, private housing societies are able to do so on various grounds. “First of all, practically it is very difficult to prove the existence of this malaise,” says Ashok Agarwal, a senior lawyer in an interview with the Hindu adding, “the government cannot regulate private housing.”