Uhm, what? Dwarka’s societies don’t really have a land encroachment issue. Most of them were built by DDA and other cooperative housing societies. There are other posh areas where land encroachment is an issue but Dwarka’s societies aren’t one of them.

Government land doesn’t mean, you can just show up and build your house there .For example there has been land which was under ASI, which is land under various monuments. There are many monuments whose land is encroached by both the poor and rich. Both are wrong, be they rich/poor, when removing such encroachment it has been fair for the most part (The only really bad cases which come to my mind are, high level government officials just having big mansions built there). This is the case for forest land as well as land coming under various departments of the government.

Many a times the land has been left there for a reason, for future development, parks, forest land, etc. Land encroachment causes a lot of issues. Also being homeless doesn’t mean they can just build a house wherever they please. You would not be okay if someone one day just shows up and builds a house on the road right in front of your house.

It is known to the people who are building their homes and livelihoods that what they are doing is illegal and there way of life can be destroyed any day, because what they are doing is illegal. The Government for a really long time had been understanding of their situation and just let them be, providing them with basic services on the encroached land. This doesn’t mean that they are right, it just means that they have their house another day.

Also, it isn’t technically correct to call these people homeless, most of them are migrant workers that came here to find better work opportunities. they found work and decided it was better to stay on unauthorized land nearby than to find legal housing which may be further away from their work. Rent in these shanties is pretty similar to legally available housing.