How can seemingly monolithic, technological infrastructure be developed incrementally? The pilot light infrastructure project at Dharavi Koliwada has helped to exemplify this process. From strategically locating the lights, thereby avoiding wasteful consumption of electricity, to installation, fabrication and maintenance, it is the residents' involvement at every stage that has made the project a success. Most importantly, the participatory nature of the project expanded its very scope from purely utilitarian infrastructure to one that reflects concerns about cultural and spatial identity.   

Like most villages, Dharavi Koliwada, an indigenous fishing village in Mumbai, relied on candlelight or kerosene lamps for illumination at night. The switch to electric lights happened gradually, depending on whether homeowners decided to connect to the supply from BEST, the civic transport and electricity provider for Mumbai. The fish market in the village used kerosene lamps right until the 1990s. Most other common areas, like the streets and open spaces, were solely moonlit at night. 

The urban village, unlike a modern gated community, is deeply embedded in its context. Its boundaries are porous and unpoliced, and its streets seamlessly join the larger street networks of the city. The socially and spatially close-knit community has thrived off this integration, never finding reason to feel unsafe.  The fisherwomen, who began their day with a journey to the wholesale fish market in pre-dawn darkness, were at ease doing so. With streets directly opening into homes, help or a secure place could be accessed almost immediately. With the electrification of homes, people’s porch lights started to lend a patchwork of light to the streets; the extent of this light marks a liminal space between the safety and intimacy of the indoors and the unlit outdoors. Residents and community groups managed the temporary lighting of streets and open spaces for festivals, weddings and other events. 

In the late 1970s, and not without a struggle, the Koli Jamat managed to convince the municipality to provide a few streetlights in the neighbourhood. Probably adequate at the time, nowadays many children go to school before the crack of dawn and young professionals, including women, work late into the night or have night shifts; the streetlights, few and far between, no longer provide a sense of safety. Additionally, while most residents have built toilets in their homes, some still rely on community toilets, which need safe access 24/7. In this evolving context, lighting for the Koliwada emerged as an urgent need to become one of the most successful projects of the ABCD of Koliwada. 

With the help of the re: arc institute, the Dharavi Koli Jamat, along with urbz and students from NYUAD (New York University, Abu Dhabi), started to think about how to incrementally set up this infrastructure using local skills and resources. Because this is a community initiative with no municipal support, the Jamat is keen on using solar energy to power the street lights and avoid expensive electricity bills. 

The first round of observations and discussions with the residents helped to identify and prioritise the street for the pilot lighting project - the Dutta Mandir street. It is one of the busiest streets in the neighbourhood, connecting people to the major roads with access to public transport. The chosen street became a testbed to prototype ideas and adapt existing technologies. 

On average, the street is about 3’ wide and turns multiple times along its length, punctuated by important landmarks like the Dutta Mandir (Temple) and an exit to the fish market. It is lined by homes on either side with unique spatial arrangements that meet the street in myriad ways. 

Each location was scouted and identified after discussion with the adjacent residents, local electricians, Vicky and Ankush, and the urbz team.

Many homes have first floors that project over the street, lending an arcade-like character to the path below. The underside of the projections became suitable surfaces to mount ceiling lights, an uncommon type of fixture when one thinks of street lighting. Two-wheelers occasionally use the pedestrian street. Wheelbarrows loaded with construction materials are a common sight. Damage caused by these movements eliminated the idea of path lights, which would be mounted at a short distance from the ground, ideal for lighting up the pathways, but vulnerable to damage from vehicles. The movement of goods and furniture through the streets was another concern. Wall-mounted lights had to be installed so as not to restrict these movements. There were many such situations which soon led us to realise that one standardised light fixture was not the answer. We would need variations - ceiling and wall-mounted lights, with and without brackets - that could adapt to the available spots. 

 Apart from the peculiarities of the physical space, other concerns were determined by individual perceptions and social dynamics. For example, many owners didn’t want us to drill holes in their walls to fix the lights; they perceived it as an action that would weaken the wall. Some residents were opposed to the idea of having lights on at night, they were concerned about the light intruding on the darkness of their homes, affecting their privacy and quality of sleep. How much light is too much light? How can we respect the darkness, a vital element in the human experience, with the need for lighting that allows us to safely inhabit the night? Concerns that had to be negotiated and balanced as we progressed with the project. 

After exploring the possibilities with at least five types of available light fixtures in the market, and considering factors such as cost, degree of weatherproofing, size and type of bulb used, we decided to experiment with LED outdoor bulkhead lights. These lights, although cost-effective, did not withstand the first monsoons and ended up being a provisional infrastructure that we eventually replaced with a more robust solution. One benefit of having installed the LED bulkhead lights was the opportunity for feedback. Our daily walks through the neighbourhood became moments of connection and recalibration. Residents shared how the streetlights made them feel safe, while pointing out which of the pilot prototypes had not withstood the monsoons. We urgently needed a financially sustainable and weatherproof solution. 

The shipbreaking yard of Alang, in Gujarat, offered us exactly what we needed. Alang’s shipbreaking yard is the largest in the world and a hub of second-hand goods, which come from recycled ships and are redistributed into local economies. One trip to Alang yielded all the lights we needed for the project. The lights sourced from retired ships contribute to the recycling of a maritime machine. A machine not unfamiliar to the Kolis. With their deep seafaring history, many Kolis transitioned to the shipping industry, easily leveraging their bond with the sea. Lights that have sailed the world now light up a street in Koliwada from 7 pm to 7 am, echoing the maritime connections of the Kolis. The lights are connected to a timer that can be set up and controlled remotely with a mobile application from anywhere in the world!  

While solar-powered street lights were a goal at the start of the project, it soon became clear that we would have to separate the lighting aspect from how they would be electrified - solar or conventional electricity. The priority was always to address the need for light, and then attempt to connect them to solar panels. Students from NYUAD continued to work on bespoke solar panel setups for a low-rise high-density habitat like Koliwada. Unfortunately, the cost of customised solar panels far outweighs any benefits. The idea had to be shelved for a time when it may be more cost-efficient to execute. Voltmeters installed at the start showed how much electricity was being consumed. This became the baseline for further exploring the type and capacity of solar panels available in the market. The Jamat, with urbz and students from NYUAD, are now looking into government subsidies, manufacturers, and suitable locations to install the panels. Ways to manage the light infrastructure are also being assessed. We foresee a combination of automation, which already controls the switching on and off of lights, along with the human infrastructure that traditionally manages resources in the community. 

During one of our neighbourhood-level public engagements (Koliwada Charcha Exhibition), several residents shared the desire to have a symbol for Dharavi Koliwada, a neighbourhood whose indigenous history they believed was overshadowed by the story of Dharavi. Responding to the need for an urban indigenous identity, we incorporated elements into the design of the brackets for the lights. Dutta Koli, a fabricator in Koliwada, helped design and fabricate brackets that allowed us to convert some ship lights into customised wall-mounted lights. The lights incorporate the name of the village in Devanagari script with illustrations of crabs, clams and other fish that Dharavi Koliwada was known for.

The need for light infrastructure emerged as part of the ABCD project. The pilot is now almost complete and has helped gain a deeper understanding of how we can leverage and amplify people’s skills and humanity, in itself a major infrastructure, to facilitate the next phases of this project. The most significant part of this process was the involvement of the resident electrician duo, Vicky Koli and Ankush Gite. Their deep knowledge of every nook and corner of the village and their familiarity with every resident allowed the community to trust the process and engage with on-site decision-making. 

Civic infrastructure is never provided for in one sweep, it is through collective needs, actions and daily practices of care and repair that effective civic infrastructure comes into existence. Many Indian cities are not evenly provisioned with civic infrastructure. The state of footpaths is a great example of how different actors stake claims and appropriate their use. Real-estate developers transgress plot boundaries to make/revamp footpaths fronting their gated developments purely for cosmetic reasons. Street vendors, unaccounted for in the planning of streets, have no choice but to take over footpaths to hawk their wares, questioning the established arrangement of roads and footpaths for street-centric Indian habitats. Most of all, it is a testament to the failure of urban planning to intersect with actual behaviours and needs.