What the lawyers say about Dharavi

I told my lawyer friend, Ganesh, this morning that I went to Dharavi. I told him that I didn’t think it was so bad. He said Dharavi is huge, and I was probably only taken to the best parts. This may be true. He said the Hindu part is not so bad, but the Muslim part is squalid. This is in line with what I know about India’s Muslims. They tend to be poorer and disadvantaged. (read at least the beginning of this article) He said that because criminal enterprises are based in Dharavi, he’s had to go there before to scout out counterfeits of our company’s products (cooking and hair oil). He said in the Muslim area, people will be pooping and cooking in the same place, and there will be animals slaughtered in the middle of the street, the blood running down the middle of the street, which is an open sewer.

It makes sense to me that the Muslim area would be worse, but Ganesh is a Hindu (a Brahmin at that), and Hindus tend to look down on Muslims. He said Muslims don’t get educated or work because they think Allah will take care of them, even if they do nothing to take care of themselves. So there may be some truth in what Ganesh says, but there may also be prejudice, racism, and classism.