A slum is an overcrowded and squalid district of a city usually inhabited by the very poor. These slums are found almost everywhere in Mumbai and other metropolitan cities in India like Chennai, Delhi and Kolkatta, and are characterized by high rates of poverty.

  Slums are breeding centers for many social problems such as crime, drugs, alcoholism. Sickness and diseases are very much prevalant due to unsanitary conditions.

  In many slums in India and particularly Mumbai, people live in very narrow alleys that do not allow vehicles (like ambulances) to pass.

  The lack of services such as routine garbage collection allows garbage to accumulate in huge quantities.

  Some slums like the Dharavi slum in Mumbai (the largest slum in Asia) is a centre where almost everything is recycled for a living.

  It is said that for every new high rise building that comes up in Mumbai atleast 2 new slums are created. 18 million people live in Mumbai, the country's commercial capital. Half of this population lives in slums and/or on the pavements.