Paper short abstract:

With an ethnographic focus on domestic migrants from Northeast India, this paper explores the politics of ethno-spatial living in New Delhi and explains what factors motivate the creation of ethnic enclaves in the mega-city at a time of deepening political and economic uncertainties and anxieties.

Paper long abstract:

Over the past 20 years or so, heightened levels of migration have contributed to transforming New Delhi into a mega-city of gigantic proportions – and with multiple new infrastructural, economic, political and social problems arising from the co-habitation of tens of thousands of people coming to the capital from all over India. More recently, global economic and geopolitical uncertainties have added to the complex problems of Delhi residents and have exacerbated their daily anxieties and struggles. Within the mega-urban patchwork of communities, livelihoods and experiences, it has become evident that migrants from Northeast India (especially from the Naga and Mizo ethnic groups) have tended to cluster in particular locations in Delhi. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in one such location in South Delhi, this paper explores the factors which have contributed to the formation of such ethnic enclaves and the daily experiences, aspirations and challenges of their Naga and Mizo residents. What is interesting about these Northeast migrants is that more so than other migrant communities, which are also often subjected to various forms of discrimination and exclusion in New Delhi, Naga and Mizo migrants are, what I call, ‘hyper-visible’ migrants who experience multi-dimensional forms of everyday violence, discrimination and exclusion in New Delhi. The paper argues that in order to understand how the hyper-visibility of Naga and Mizo migrants influences their residential choices, we need to gain better insights into their everyday lived experiences amidst the ever-increasing uncertainty and precariousness of the urban mode of life in this mega-city.