Disabling criminalization of the homeless via begging prevention laws in cities: a case for contemporary Maharashtra, India

In the policy discourse on urban poor, the homeless – including hawkers, pavement dwellers and evicted slum dwellers, among other groups – have been understood as a ‘crisis in the city’. Seen as encroachers and the result of failed urban planning, laws and judicial interventions have not given them the space in cities that they have demanded through litigation. Instead, one observes a re-emphasis on referring to these groups as a ‘challenge of urban crisis’, or illegal occupants, primarily through begging prevention legislation that has criminalized the urban homeless. This paper describes how the legal situation, through laws such as the Bombay Prevention of Begging Act (BPBA) 1959, creates difficult lives for those who participate actively in the life of the city. I argue for the amendment of a colonial law that serves to criminalize and exclude the homeless in India’s metropolitan cities.