As temperatures in Indian cities soar past 45 degrees Celsius and air quality remains in the “severe” category for weeks on end, the silent casualties of this climate emergency are the people least responsible for creating it: daily wage earners, domestic workers, waste pickers, construction labourers, street vendors, and millions who live in informal settlements. India’s cities are becoming unlivable—not for those in high-rise apartments with water purifiers and backup generators, but for the working poor who inhabit its underbellies. Most of them live in dense, poorly ventilated dwellings made of asbestos, tin, or plastic sheets, which trap heat during the day and radiate it all night. They have limited access to clean drinking water, barely functioning public toilets, and almost no healthcare support when illnesses—respiratory or heat-induced—strike. As India embraces the rhetoric of smart cities and climate adaptation, it’s increasingly clear that the urban poor remain on the periphery of policy, both literally and figuratively. They are the ones who construct the buildings, clean the homes, sweep the streets, and keep the cities running, yet are treated as expendable in both climate planning and civic governance.
The recent heatwaves have exposed this inequality with harrowing precision. In Delhi, reports of labourers collapsing at construction sites have been met with apathy, even as the Delhi High Court was forced to intervene and direct the government to ensure shaded work areas, water breaks, and heat protection measures. In Ahmedabad, where the country’s first Heat Action Plan was once lauded as a model, deaths continue to occur in bastis where the electricity supply is erratic and temperatures inside homes surpass the already scorching outside heat. Many cities have witnessed water riots in low-income neighbourhoods, with residents forced to queue for hours in the blazing sun for a single tanker. Meanwhile, privileged residential areas continue to receive uninterrupted water supply and enjoy lush gardens kept green through borewells. The contrast is even sharper when one looks at how the poor are criminalised in their survival—pavement dwellers are evicted for “encroaching public land,” hawkers are removed for obstructing traffic, and slum settlements are demolished to make way for beautification drives or G20 optics. They are seen not as citizens with rights but as obstacles to be cleared, even though they contribute to the city’s economy in essential but invisible ways.
This structural inequality is further compounded by planning that actively excludes the needs of the working poor. Indian cities continue to prioritise expressways, gated townships, and corporate real estate at the cost of inclusive urban development. There are no provisions for heat-resilient housing for informal workers, no shaded walking routes for those who cannot afford cars, and no serious investment in clean, reliable public water systems for settlements beyond the planning maps. Public transport networks like the metro are often priced out of reach for daily wagers, and areas with the highest pollution—often near landfill sites, industrial zones, or traffic corridors—are where the poor are pushed to reside. The irony is stark: those who contribute least to carbon emissions suffer the most from their consequences. The idea of “climate justice” is reduced to a buzzword when the response to heatwaves is to tell people to stay indoors and hydrate, in cities where thousands have no homes and no clean water to drink. What India’s urban climate crisis demands is not just technical solutions but a political and ethical reckoning. The poor are not passive victims of weather—they are active agents of urban life whose dignity, health, and safety must be protected.
To move forward, city governments must shift from cosmetic projects to equity-driven planning. This includes legally recognising informal settlements instead of razing them, integrating heat and pollution adaptation measures into slum redevelopment, ensuring that every ward has cooling shelters and access to potable water, and treating informal workers as citizens, not liabilities. Urban resilience cannot be achieved through gated walls and digital dashboards—it must be built through democratic participation, decentralised governance, and targeted protection for the most vulnerable. Climate change will not wait for India’s cities to catch up, and the window to act with justice is closing fast. The reality is that Indian cities, if left on their current path, will become increasingly hostile places for the very people who make them function. The measure of a city is not its skyline or GDP, but how it treats its poorest in moments of crisis. If we cannot keep our most exposed citizens safe during a heatwave, what kind of future are we really building?