Articles
Cultivation of Self-Image among Youth in Urban Squatter Settlements:
The Significance of Secondary Education in Contemporary India
2024 Volume 14 Pages 1-19
Details
2024 Volume 14 Pages 1-19
This study examines the significance of secondary education for lower-class youth by focusing on the self-image they constructed through secondary education. It draws on the youth’s perceptions of their current situation and prospects in urban squatter settlements. It aims to shed light on opportunities beyond obtaining academic qualifications for upward social mobility created by secondary education. The youth who participated in this study would be imagined as either ‘failures’ or ‘halfways’, as indicated by previous studies. This designation stems from the perspective of academic qualifications aimed at advancing higher education and acquiring employment opportunities. However, young people living in squatter settlements can create the perceived self-image they want and the self-image they should have with reference to their academic qualifications and friendships in secondary education. These become essential reference points in the presence of out-of-school friends, girls in squatter settlements engaged only in domestic chores, and parents who have their preferred images of the youth.
Expectations of social mobility through education have increased among the youth of India’s upper and lower classes in the 21st century. Since 2000, the gross enrolment ratio in secondary education has been increasing steadily along with the prevalence of primary education, reaching approximately 80%.1 However, for economically and socially disadvantaged youth (hereafter referred to as ‘lower-class youth’), it is difficult to obtain stable jobs in the formal sector, such as in large private companies or government jobs, even if they attain higher education (Jeffrey 2010; Sasaki 2010; Mehrotra et al. 2012; Chand and Srivastava 2014; Jakimow 2016; Kaur and Sundar 2016). Given the uncertainty of upward social mobility through education, the question of the significance of secondary education for young people arises. Considering the substantial proportion of young people in India’s total population of approximately 1.3 billion,2 it is crucial to look beyond the one-sided perspective of academic qualifications for upward social mobility and comprehensively examine how young people perceive their current situation and prospects through secondary education, which influence the social transformation of contemporary India. This study examines the significance of secondary education for lower-class youth by focusing on the self-image they constructed through secondary education, because self-perception is a critical aspect of the process of realising one’s ideal life (Zabiliūté 2016; Branagan 2020). It draws on the youth’s perceptions of their current situation and prospects in urban squatter settlements formed by the illegal occupation of state-owned land in Delhi. Unless otherwise specified, this paper refers to youth as those in their late teens and early twenties in January 2020 attending Delhi government secondary schools and the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS),3 which accepts students who have dropped out of secondary education.
1.1. Significance of Secondary EducationPrevious debates on the significance of education in Indian society can be categorised into two main streams: development studies, which views education as a fundamental human right, and social mobility studies, which views education as a resource for obtaining employment opportunities. From the perspective of development studies, basic education, such as literacy and basic arithmetic, is crucial for changing people’s lives by, for example, acquiring knowledge to empower political participation and promote women’s voices in the home (Drèze and Sen 2013). Education is not only the acquisition of knowledge but also a resource for people to recognise the situations they face and try to change them. Accordingly, the lack of access to education due to the inadequate infrastructure of government primary schools and the negligence of teachers has long been posited as a fundamental human rights problem (PROBE Team 1999; De et al. 2011). In this context, policies and systems have been developed to provide high-quality primary education. The Indian Constitution guaranteed the right to education in 2002 as embodied in the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act of 2009 (hereafter referred to as ‘RTE Act’). However, importantly, the RTE Act only applies to children in the primary education stage, whereas students in the secondary education stage are excluded from free and compulsory education. Thus, withdrawal from primary education is regarded as a violation of fundamental human rights, whereas withdrawal from secondary education is justified as a failure to obtain an academic qualification because of an individual’s inability to pass the final exam (Nawani 2018). Therefore, when the significance of secondary education is investigated within the framework of development studies, it is not treated as a fundamental human rights issue but as an issue in the formation of academic qualifications for advancing to higher education.
Social mobility studies, however, examine the significance of education from the perspective of whether lower-class youth can move between social classes after receiving education. For instance, it has been argued that employment opportunities, such as those in the information technology (IT) industry, are open to anyone with specialised knowledge and skills, regardless of their caste or class because of the liberalisation of the Indian economy. However, IT companies tend to employ highly educated youth from urban upper/middle classes fluent in English (Upadhya 2007). To obtain employment opportunities in the new economic space created after economic liberalisation, it is not enough to be highly educated; one must also be able to create an ‘appearance’ appropriate for the space to which one wishes to belong (Kaur and Sundar 2016). Regarding the background of this discrepancy between academic qualifications and employment opportunities, Sasaki (2010) highlighted that the Indian school system transitioning from primary to secondary education is structured according to the systems aligned with the secondary school board examinations conducted in different languages. Whether students can choose an elite, high-cost private school with English as the language of instruction or are forced to attend a free government school where the language of instruction is the local language depends on the economic status of each family during the primary education stage. Sasaki referred to young people—who attended government schools, passed the state board exam in their local language, and graduated from college but could not obtain commensurate formal sector jobs by accumulating academic qualifications—as ‘halfway educated’ (Sasaki 2010). However, although the limitations of upward social mobility through academic qualifications have become apparent, young people attending colleges in regional cities still wait to obtain employment opportunities while acquiring several degrees in different academic fields (Jeffrey 2010). Despite scepticism of the significance of education for obtaining employment opportunities, studies have shown that academic qualifications are essential for improving the prospects of young people who are aware of their current situation. Social mobility studies have focused on the relationship between higher education and employment opportunities. These studies view secondary education as part of the formation of academic qualifications that connect primary and higher education. This debate has created a framework concerning the significance of education for young people in acquiring employment opportunities in the formal sector.
As mentioned earlier, previous discussions on the significance of education differ considerably between those viewing education as a fundamental human right and those viewing it as a resource for acquiring employment opportunities. The former focus on primary education, whereas the latter focuses on higher education. When focusing on secondary education, both studies posit that education plays a significant role in forming academic qualifications for advancement towards higher education and acquiring employment opportunities. This significance alone cannot explain the current situation wherein most young people advance to secondary education because the limitations of upward social mobility through the formation of academic qualifications are apparent. As previous studies have shown, education is a resource for young people to recognise and transform their current situation or look towards the future. Therefore, to capture the impact of secondary education on social transformation in contemporary India, more research is required to comprehend the significance of secondary education beyond the perspective of forming academic qualifications for social advancement, as proposed by previous studies. Thus, it is necessary to explore the opportunities that secondary education provides to young people, including dropouts, and clarify their perceptions of their current situation and prospects.
1.2. Urban Youth and Self-ImageIn large cities, such as Delhi and Mumbai, people tend to perceive their city as a world-class urban location, both beautiful and clean. This perception is common not only among the rich and middle classes but also among government and court employees. For example, when an aesthetically pleasing shopping mall was planned adjacent to illegally occupied settlements in an urban environmentally protected area, its construction was permitted, whereas the squatter settlements were demolished by the government because they were unplanned and considered a nuisance to the neighbouring upscale residential area by the courts (Ghertner 2015). Since 2000, India’s metropolises have tended to segregate urban spaces according to economic and social stratification (Fernandes 2006; Sadana 2010; Dupont 2008; Ghertner 2015). Specifically, people and neighbourhoods from lower strata are deemed ‘unworthy’ of the image of world-class urban beauty, cleanliness, and consumer culture that permeate the city; thus, they are excluded or marginalised.
Indian youth studies have captured the experiences of young people, mostly those in their teens and twenties, living in cities where spatial segregation is increasingly prevalent. For instance, in Bengaluru, where the IT industry is flourishing, middle-class youth who have graduated from IT-related higher education courses gather at cyber cafés to drink chai and chat. On weekends, they go on excursions to local scenic spots, stay at cheap hotels, and spend large sums of money on alcohol. They emulate elite practices, as depicted in Indian movies, to escape the pressures of the city and indulge themselves in resorts (Nisbett 2007). Furthermore, young people in their teens and twenties living in the squatter settlements of Hyderabad have diverse academic qualifications and work situations. Some examples include a young man who dropped out of school at the upper primary stage and was engaged in day labour at construction sites, a young man who attended senior secondary school and earned money only during summer holidays by doing odd jobs in pharmacies, and a young man who completed secondary education and was attending college. They all regularly gathered at a specific location (e.g., a mobile phone shop) after school or work to enjoy games, music, and videos via their mobile phones (Rangaswamy and Cutrell 2012). Indian youth studies have captured experiences of young people sharing time with friends from the same social class and pursuing leisure activities in different spaces according to their class.
This seems an extension of the earlier discussion regarding urban space. However, subsequent Indian youth studies have investigated young people, especially those from the lower class, seeking to realise their ‘aspirations’ (Appadurai 2004)4 while crossing the spatial boundaries of different social strata. For instance, Zabiliūté (2016) described poor young men in their twenties in Delhi who dropped out of elementary school, walked through streets lined with luxury houses, and went to shopping malls without buying anything. They looked at skyscrapers, splendid houses, and the people who lived there, observing their fashion. In this process, they would be scorned when they were found to be residents of squatter settlements and thus, they walked around the city using strategies to blend in with the crowds, such deceiving people from the upper classes and wearing modern clothes. Branagan (2020) explored teenage girls and young women who have studied at college through distance education. They are growing up in low-income families in Delhi dressed in popular urban attire rather than their mothers’ saris, using the English-mixed Hindi spoken in Delhi rather than the rural dialect, visiting shopping malls without their parents’ permission and buying nothing from the air-conditioned spaces, and simply walking around, thereby playing out an upper-class identity while enjoying consumer culture.
In contemporary Indian cities, characterised by spatial segregation according to class, lower-class youth construct a self-image appropriate for a world-class city and an urban space permeated by consumer culture. To achieve this self-image, they emulate upper-class clothing and language and use strategies to temporarily conceal their origins and position. These studies have demonstrated that the perceived self-image has a critical impact on young people’s behaviour. However, by focusing on temporary strategies for entering and exiting posh neighbourhoods and shopping malls, previous studies have failed to adequately capture the self-image that young people construct in places where others recognise their origins and positions. Moreover, previous research has not sufficiently clarified how education is related to young people’s perceived self-image, even if it focuses on youth with different educational experiences. Therefore, this study examines the relationship between young people’s perceptions of their current situation and their prospects through secondary education, focusing on the self-image of young people in squatter settlements.
1.3. Ethnographic Contexts and Research MethodsThe research site was an urban squatter settlement in northeast Delhi (hereafter referred to as the ‘W area’). The area surrounding the W area, bordering the neighbouring state of Uttar Pradesh (UP), has been undergoing urban development since the 1970s under the leadership of the Delhi Development Authority to create a middle-class residential area inhabited by middle-class families (with a monthly income of approximately Rs. 50,000–100,000). The government-built resettlement sites around it for those forced to migrate when squatter settlements were cleared out during the Indira Gandhi regime. Urban squatter settlements fill the spaces between settlements. Since the 1990s, shopping malls have been constructed and the metro line extended in northeast Delhi. There are also several industrial areas, and numerous poor people have migrated from other parts of Delhi and UP in search of work. The population of northeast Delhi increased by 26.8% during 2001–11, which is higher than Delhi’s average population growth rate of 21.2% over the same period. In particular, northeast Delhi had the highest population density (36,155 inhabitants/km²), scheduled caste population growth rate (26.7%), and percentage of children aged 0–6 years (13.5%) in Delhi. Importantly, it also had the lowest literacy rate of 83.1% (Joshi 2013).
In June 2014, the author conducted a household survey in the W area over approximately one and a half months. There were 2,298 people residing in 505 households in the area. Approximately a quarter of the residents of the W area were Muslims, and the majority of the remainder were Hindus. Regarding caste, a large proportion of the population belonged to the kolī, a caste traditionally engaged in textiles, and the chamār, traditionally engaged in processing livestock and animal carcasses and working in the leather industry. Both are designated as scheduled castes by the Delhi government.5 These individuals were not engaged in their caste-based occupations and worked predominantly in the informal sector as factory workers, construction workers, electricians, and drivers. The average monthly household income of the residents in the W area was Rs. 4,400, which is approximately half of the minimum wage in Delhi in 2014.6 While the generation of the parents was typically from UP, young people in their late teens and early twenties were born in the W area and attended school in the neighbourhood (Chaya 2020).
Furthermore, this area is viewed as a hotbed of crime. This perception is common both outside and inside the squatter settlements. A famous local black market is located southeast of the W area. In this market, mobile phones, smartphones, torches, other electronics, and watches are arranged haphazardly on sheets on the road. Neighbours often view these goods as stolen because of the frequent incidents of theft and robbery, usually committed at night, in this area. Middle-class residents near the W area view the residents of squatter settlements as criminals. Iron fences have been erected to prevent the residents of squatter settlements from entering middle-class neighbourhoods. However, the residents of squatter settlements are often the victims of these crimes. The residents of the W area believe the perpetrators to be the residents of squatter settlements in the adjacent areas. Thus, even among the residents of squatter settlements, crimes may be blamed on residents of other squatter settlements. In addition, drug crimes affected the perceptions of residents both outside and inside the W area, with drug users being visible during the daytime in open spaces and streets adjoining squatter settlements. Parents in the W area instruct their children not to play in open spaces and streets where drug users are present. The residents of squatter settlements have complained that although the police sometimes arrest drug users, they are usually released after several days of detention after paying a bribe. Thus, facts and discourses surrounding theft, robbery, drug crimes, black markets, and security gates combine to form a perception that strongly links the W area and its residents with crime (Chaya 2020).
Participatory observations and interviews were conducted daily with young people in the W area in Hindi. The data presented in Sections 3 and 4 were collected in January 2020 and August 2022, respectively, whereas the other primary data were collected over 19 months and one week of intermittent fieldwork conducted between July 2012 and August 2022. Based on this long-term fieldwork, the author captured the narrative tendencies among the lower-class youth in the W area. The author selects and presents typical narratives in Sections 3 and 4. All names of interviewees appearing in this paper are pseudonyms.
As a prerequisite for discussing the significance of secondary education for young people from the lower classes, this section clarifies the current state of the secondary education system in Delhi, focusing on the Delhi government’s secondary schools attended by young people living in the W area.
Secondary education in India is the educational stage that follows compulsory primary education (grades 1–8). It comprises two years each of secondary and senior secondary education and is mainly attended by young people aged 14–18 years. This education stage is characterised by students being allowed to stay in or drop out of class based on their academic performance, which is not the case in the primary education stage. The examinations required for progressing to senior secondary education are held in the 10th grade, whereas the final examinations required for progression to higher education are held in the 12th grade. Government secondary schools, operating under the jurisdiction of the Education Department of the Government of the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, adopted a curriculum prepared by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE). Young people are required to sit for the final examinations prepared by the CBSE. The pass rates, especially for the 12th grade CBSE examination in Government School J (hereafter referred to as the ‘J school’) and Government School B (hereafter referred to as the ‘B school’)7 near the W area, are above 90% almost every year (Table 1).
| Boys J School (6–12th) | Girls J School (Nur.–12th) | ||||
| Grade10 | Grade 12 | Grade 10 | Grade 12 | ||
| 2020–21 | 90.79 | 100 | 100 | 100 | |
| 2019–20 | 83.40 | 94.34 | 82.77 | 98.78 | |
| 2018–19 | 76.34 | 99.23 | 80.76 | 96.26 | |
| 2017–18 | 92.46 | 97.99 | 58.16 | 96.58 | |
| Boys B School (6–12th) | Girls B School (Nur.–12th) | ||||
| Grade 10 | Grade 12 | Grade 10 | Grade 12 | ||
| 2020–21 | 78.89 | 99.38 | 100 | 100 | |
| 2019–20 | 61.38 | 94.90 | 96.75 | 100 | |
| 2018–19 | 49.78 | 96.71 | 72.61 | 97.31 | |
| 2017–18 | 56.95 | 85.59 | 33.98 | 82.47 | |
Source: Prepared by the author based on the List of Government Schools, Department of Education, NCT of Delhi. http://www.edudel.nic.in/mis/schoolplant/school_information.htm (accessed 6 March 2020).
One of the problems identified by the Delhi government regarding secondary education is that the grade-9 pass rate is low because students who perform poorly on regular grade-9 examinations are either retained in their original grade or subsequently drop out. Delhi’s overall grade-9 pass rate has declined since 2013; it was 55.96% in 2013, 51.74% in 2014, and 50.78% in 2015.8 This problem is attributed to the absence of a retention mechanism at the primary level and the fact that students with different basic academic abilities are enrolled in the same class. This creates a burden on teachers to bring students with particularly low academic abilities to the desired level. Therefore, the Delhi Government has implemented a new education plan, called Chunauti 2018, to support grade-9 students. This plan introduces a mechanism for setting up classes according to academic performance to reduce the burden on teachers arising from differences in student achievement within the same class. Under this plan, at the late primary stage (grades 6–8), students are divided into two classes: one with higher and the other with lower academic achievement, mainly based on the results of an examination known as the basic assessment, which measures reading, writing, and calculation skills and is administered in Hindi and English. Furthermore, at the secondary stage, students are divided into three classes according to their academic achievement in grade 9. In addition, the Delhi Government has begun implementing initiatives to improve basic literacy and numeracy skills, including students enrolled in primary education (grades 3–5). Thus, the Delhi Government has adopted a policy of assessing the basic academic performance of students from the primary education level and has created classes according to academic achievement in upper primary education to prevent dropouts from the secondary stage, especially from grade 9.
In India’s secondary education system, students tend to remain in their original grades, especially in grade 9. Additionally, students drop out based on academic performance, which is not permitted at the primary education level. Thus, the secondary education system is more selective than primary education. In the case of Delhi, in particular, the pass rate of students from grade 9 to grade 10 is low. The Delhi government has taken measures to address this issue by introducing classes based on academic performance, thereby reinforcing meritocracy.
This section captures how young people in the W area construct their self-image through the academic qualifications of secondary education.
3.1. These Jobs Do Not Require the Completion of Grade 12The author spoke to Shabnam, a 15-year-old girl from a Muslim family. She and her mother were in a room with a king-sized bed, TV, cupboards, and a sewing machine. Shabnam, who was attending grade-10 Hindi-medium (HM) class at J school, wanted to complete grade 12, graduate from college with a law degree, and obtain a job in a court. She developed this aspiration because a female teacher at the cram school, which she attended when she was 10–12 years old, had graduated from a law college, worked in the courts, and told Shabnam how good the job was. The author felt somewhat uneasy about Shabnam’s optimism surrounding these dreams, as the author frequently met young persons in the W area who had dropped out after grade 9 or started working despite completing grade 10. Upon further questioning, it became clear that Shabnam was using her secondary school education as a reference to perceive her self-image and determine an appropriate job for herself.
Author: What do you plan to do if you do not pass the grade-10 board exam?
Shabnam: I am not thinking about what I will do. I only think about passing. In grade 11, we have three courses: a commerce course, a liberal arts course, and a science course. If you join a commerce course, you can work in the private sector, the bank, or something else. If you join a liberal arts course, you can become a teacher or judge. A science course is the most difficult, but if you join it, you have a better chance of becoming a doctor or researcher.
Author: I see. I know some young women in the W area who work in factories or beauty salons. What do you think of these jobs?
Shabnam: It is not necessary to complete grade 12 to obtain these jobs. Thus, factory and beauty salon work are not appropriate for me.
Shabnam’s mother, who helped her husband’s tailoring business by sewing, suddenly entered the conversation, perhaps unable to remain silent upon hearing the author’s misguided questions and her daughter’s answers. Her mother had never attended school and had been a domestic helper for many years.
Shabnam’s mother: Working in a factory is not good because there are many men who look at her in a disgusting way. Beauty salon work is good but is beneath her because she has to touch dirty parts while washing and massaging customers’ heads and feet. By contrast, a tailoring job can be done from inside the house; if she has a baby, she can work while looking after the child. Who will care for her children or do household chores if she goes to work outside? A tailoring job is good because she can do both the work and household chores.
Shabnam listened to her mother with no change in her facial expressions. Thus, both she and her mother agreed that factory and beauty salon works in the informal sector were inappropriate. However, regarding the reasons for this, Shabnam judged herself based on her secondary school academic qualifications, whereas her mother judged these options based on the characteristics of the workplace and the improprieties associated with the nature of the work. Narratives such as Shabnam’s, in which she perceived her self-image with reference to her academic qualifications and judged a job as appropriate for herself, are not found among young people in the W area who had dropped out of secondary school and those who had only attended primary school.9 For young people attending the highly selective secondary education in urban squatter settlements, the courses in senior secondary school and the grades they complete serve as a reference point for determining their ideal self-image, which they then use as a basis for deciding whether a job is appropriate for them. The following case study discusses the link between attending J school and the youth’s perceived self-image in urban squatter settlements.
3.2. Belonging to the Middle ClassBabli (15 years old) lived on the ground floor of a three-story house owned by her grandmother in the W area with her mother, who worked as a babysitter in a lawyer’s house. Her mother’s sister, Sonia, and her two-year-old daughter lived on the second floor. As of August 2022, Babli attended J school, in the grade-9 HM class. When the author asked Babli about how she was doing at school, she coincidentally discussed her sense of class consciousness.
Author: Who is the most popular girl among your classmates?
Babli: Um, Khushi.
Author: Why is she popular? What traits does she have?
Babli: First, she studies a lot. She is like a girl whose hobby is studying.
Author: Why is she popular? There are other girls who can study or have hobbies like studying, right?
Babli: Yes, there are. Khushi is popular because she is funny.
Author: What does funny look like?
Babli: For example, when the teacher is not around, she makes our classmates laugh by displaying noisy dances in front of everyone.
Author: I see. Does she possess any other traits?
Babli: Well, when there are friends who have not brought anything for lunch, she shares her own lunch so that everyone can eat.
Author: I see. By the way, does she live in the A area (predominantly middle-class area)? Does she belong to the middle class?
Babli: Yes, she is middle class. Just like us. She used to live in the B Colony (a residential area set aside by the government for people with disabilities).
The author was somewhat surprised by the statement ‘Yes, she is middle class. Just like us’. Nevertheless, the author continued to make conversation based on her perception. However, Sonia, who overheard the conversation, suddenly intervened.
Sonia: Babli. She does not belong to the middle class. What do her parents do for a living?
Babli: Her father is a driver, and her mother is a vaccinator at the Anganwadi Centre.
Sonia: That is an ASHA [accredit social health activist] worker. You see, the people who do this kind of work are poor. We are poor people too. Tomo (author), do you understand? When your income is low, you must constantly worry about your daily expenses, how much and where you spend money. This is an enormous amount of tension. If we had more income, we would not have to think much about costs. There would be less tension.
Author: But, Babli thought that she belonged to the middle class. Why?
Babli: I thought we were in the middle class because there are children who attend J school who live in the A area (where the middle class predominantly lives).
Sonia: No, we are poor.
Babli: I see ... (with a somewhat dejected expression on her face).
Thus, Babli, who attended grade 9 at J school, perceived herself and her family as belonging to the middle class. She used her experience of going to school attended by many children living in a middle-class neighbourhood as a reference point. However, after Sonia pointed out that her self-image was incorrect, Babli realised the discrepancy between her self-image and reality.
As described above, youth in squatter settlements attending secondary school create their ideal self-images. They recognise the appropriate job and class to which they belong using their academic qualifications—such as courses in senior secondary school, grades they had completed, and their schools that attended by children living in middle-class neighbourhoods—as a reference point. In the following section, the author examines how young people in the W area with secondary education experience perceive their self-image using their friends as reference points.
Rohan (20 years old) lived in the W area with his parents and three younger brothers. His father was a day labourer in the construction industry, whereas his mother was a homemaker. Rohan attended the school of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi from grades 1 to 5 and the HM class of J school from grades 6 to 11. After failing regular examinations, he began attending grade 12 at the NIOS and worked in a gym as a trainer. He worked from 5:00 to 11:00 and from 16:00 to 22:00 earning Rs. 10,000 per month. He never had a full day off. On Sundays, he worked from 7:00 to 10:00 and spent his afternoons playing cricket in a nearby park with friends living in the W area. The author spoke to Rohan on a Sunday afternoon. Wearing black sweatpants and a black hoodie on his bare chest, Rohan narrated the following story about his journey, from dropping out of school to working as a trainer.
Rohan: I failed the economics and English exams in grade 11, and a class teacher told me about the NIOS. Therefore, I wondered whether I should start working or continue my education and I decided to work while going to the NIOS. When I asked my ‘good’ friends about the NIOS, they told me that I should continue my education to build a good life.
Author: Who are ‘good’ friends?
Rohan: I am in two groups. One group is the friends with whom I play cricket. The other is the ‘bad’ friends. I am in two groups because if I have any problems, it is useful to have two connections. Each group has a different conversation topic. In the group of ‘good’ friends, we talk about work- and study-related topics. All my friends in this group think positively. The friend who introduced me to work was a friend with whom I play cricket. By contrast, the ‘bad’ friends are negative. I drink and chat with them. My ‘bad’ friends also smoke, but I do not smoke because it is not good as for a trainer if the body is weak. I rely on my ‘bad’ friends for problems related to fights within the squatter settlements.
The most educated member among Rohan’s ‘good’ friends was Mukul (22 years old), who wore dark-rimmed square glasses. Mukul was born in the W area, completed grade 12 of the HM class at J school, and was studying at a private college at the time of the study. Nitin (18 years old) dropped out of the grade-9 HM class at J school after failing the English and mathematics examinations. Since then, he worked with his relatives in an office furniture manufacturing factory. As he wanted to become a factory supervisor, he continued his studies by attending the NIOS. Maneesh (20 years old) attended an HM class in J school up to grade 10 and passed the final examinations; however, his father was unable to work due to a leg injury, and Maneesh left school to support the family. Rohan reported that these three friends did not drink or smoke and did not associate themselves with the ‘bad guys’ in the squatter settlements.
Thus, the youth in squatter settlements who enjoyed cricket, whom Rohan referred to as ‘good’ friends, shared at least some experience of secondary education, although some proceeded to college, whereas others dropped out of school because they had to work. By contrast, the young people he referred to as ‘bad’ friends dropped out of school at the primary level. Rohan used his two sets of friends as a reference point to construct an appropriate self-image, and to realise this self-image, he decided to attend the NIOS and not smoke cigarettes. Nevertheless, Rohan was aware that his perceived self-image did not fully correspond to either the ‘good’ or ‘bad’ friends used as reference points.
4.2. Perception of Being Different from ‘Slum Girls’Deepa (18 years old), dressed in jeans and a red kameez, often sat cross-legged on her bed on the ground floor of her house, watching television. She attended the HM class at J school from grades 1 to 9. She had no problems up to grade 8. Although she received bad marks on examinations, she was not held back in the same grade. However, the situation changed drastically when she moved to grade 9. At the end of the semester, she failed social science, a subject she was not good at, and then failed again the following year. Consequently, she left J school and her friendships at J school ceased. As Rohan, she now attends the NIOS, as advised by her class teacher in J school before she left the school. The fees of NIOS range from Rs. 1,200 to Rs. 2,000 depending on the educational stage, gender, and social category. Young people in the W area can easily attend the NIOS if they obtain their parent’s support. Deepa often visited the cybercafé at the corner of the shopping street closest to the W area. The café, with only a few computers available, did not offer online classes; rather, it offered face-to-face classes in a small room. According to Deepa, when she was at J school, each subject had a different teacher, whereas in the café, one teacher was in charge of all the subjects, which is not a good learning environment. Nevertheless, she always went to the café when she had classes and returned home as soon as the classes were over. This is because her mother did not allow her to linger, as it could lead to crime and problems with gender relations, which are the subjects of unwanted rumours in squatter settlements.
When Deepa sat on the bed with her mother watching television one evening, the author also casually sat on the bed and started watching a TV programme with them. When the commercials came on, the author asked Deepa about her studies at the café. She digressed in the middle of her answer and started talking about her friends in the café. The author wondered aloud, ‘Do you go to the café to study? Or do you go there to meet your friends?’ She glanced at her mother and replied, ‘Of course, I go to the café to study’. Her mother laughed at her answer. Later, when her mother went upstairs to cook dinner, the author asked her again about what was going on in the café. She began to speak more freely than when her mother was next to her.
Deepa: It is easy to study in open schools, and I really enjoy talking to my friends in the café because the girls who left primary school in the W area only talk about household chores, as that is what they do. They talk about what to cook for a meal and how much vegetables cost in the market. I get bored. I want to talk more about my studies and movies. I have to wash clothes and dishes at home because the open school is currently shut for the holidays, but my mother does every household chore when open school is in session. If I go to the café to study, I do not have to do household chores.
When Deepa went to the café, she would wear the clothes she usually wore in squatter settlements, such as jeans and kameez. The friends she talked to in the café were aware that she lived in a squatter settlement. Two friends (both women, 18 and 19 years old) she met at the café lived in households with monthly household incomes of approximately Rs. 50,000–100,000. They were from distinctly different economic conditions compared with those of the W area, where the average monthly household income was Rs. 4,400. Deepa constructed the self-image she wanted by comparing herself with the friends she met at the café and the ‘slum girls’ (only engaged in household chores) in her words as reference points. The self-image was that of one escaping the burden of housework, spending time with friends, and talking about studies and movies. However, despite constructing such a self-image, she had to return to the life of household chores during school holidays, without meeting and chatting with her friends on the weekend, as her mother forbade her from doing so. This was accompanied by the recognition that she cannot always embody the self-image she constructed for herself.
4.3. Experience of a Middle-Class LifestyleNiha (18 years old) attended grade 12 of J school’s English-medium (hereafter referred to as EM) class. As EM classes are only open to students with good academic performance, young people in the W area rarely attend such classes. Although her father earned approximately Rs. 4,000 at that time selling various fruits on a trolley in the market, her good academic performance led to increased parental support for her education. After her lessons, she spent time with her female friends for approximately an hour in a park in a middle-class neighbourhood near the school. The seven friends with whom she usually spent time were all young people from middle-class families whom she met at school. They were aware that Niha was the only resident of a squatter settlement among them. She chatted with these friends in the park after lessons and sang and danced with them while watching YouTube on her friend’s smartphone because she did not have one. She often listened to Dhvani Bhanushali, a female singer born in 1998. She was approximately the same age as Niha, and her songs ‘Vaaste’ and ‘Leja Re’ were released when Dhvani was 21, and had a combined total of one billion views on YouTube. The music video for ‘Vaaste’ takes place at a university, where the main characters, a man and a woman, meet and fall in love through a dropped smartphone. The music video depicts a young woman who speaks a mixture of English and Hindi. Thus, Niha was exposed to a lifestyle shared by her friends at school.
Niha and her younger sister attended an English conversation school every Monday in a middle-class neighbourhood west of the W area. The school fees were approximately Rs. 500 per month. They changed into jeans and grey hoodies around 16:30 and started preparing to go out. Approximately 10 young people gathered in one room to discuss a different topic each week for an hour from 17:00 to 18:00. Niha and her sister were the only students from the squatter settlements. The other students were young people of the same age from middle-class neighbourhoods who attended secondary schools and colleges. All students, both male and female, dressed in jeans and shirts. The two male teachers were college students; they encouraged discussions in a mixture of English and Hindi. On the day the author visited the school with Niha and her sister, the debate topic was ‘which is more important, English or Hindi?’ Students formed groups according to what they thought was more important and debated in English. Four students argued that Hindi was more important, whereas six students, including Niha and her sister, claimed that English was more important. One of the students who thought English was important asked, ‘How do you talk to people from all over the world’? This was countered with ‘How do you talk to an older person who only speaks Hindi?’ Hindi’s importance was further highlighted by the notion that ‘Hindi is important because it is our mother tongue’. As the debate progressed, the teacher asked Niha and her sister, who had not said anything, ‘Do you speak Hindi with your family?’ Niha replied ‘Yes’, albeit with difficulty. The debate became heated and continued for an hour. Niha only commented when she was asked by the teacher. As the debate did not end at 18:00, the teacher suggested extending the debate time. All the students (including women) from the middle-class neighbourhoods were to stay behind and discuss the issue. However, when Niha and her sister said they had to go home, the teacher took up the fact that the author was visiting the school and persuaded her to stay there for an extra half hour. Nevertheless, Niha decided to go home, saying that her mother would be worried. This conversation with the teacher occurred entirely in Hindi. Both Niha and her sister went home, feeling sad and remaining silent.
At approximately 16:00 the next day, Niha washed the dishes as usual. When she finished, she told her mother that she would not attend the cram school that day because a birthday party was planned for a friend from a middle-class family. However, her mother did not appear to be willing to let her attend the party. When her mother asked her about the time the party would be held, she said it was from 17:00 to 19:30. Her mother was surprised to hear this. Clearly, she wanted to say that it was too late. It is not desirable for young women to go out at night for safety reasons. In addition, especially in squatter settlements, if a young woman goes out alone at night, rumours spread that she is engaged in sex work, which can lead to losing family honour. Nevertheless, because she wanted to attend a birthday party, she persuaded her mother by telling her that the party was for a school friend and that she would be home after 19:30. Her mother reluctantly allowed her to go out.
Thus, Niha exhibited a self-image of enjoying the middle-class lifestyle among her middle-class friends, with whom she connected in the secondary and cram schools, through exposure to smartphones, music videos, a mix of English and Hindi speech, music, and birthday parties. Simultaneously, she was aware of the reality of not being able to live up to her perceived self-image. She borrowed her friends’ smartphones to watch videos and was unable to speak English fluently, despite wearing the same clothes as the other participants in an English conversation school. Furthermore, she was unable to decide when to go home on her own, and her mother demanded that she did not become the subject of unwanted rumours in the squatter settlements. Moreover, when the author asked her how she felt about these experiences, she could only say that she enjoyed being with her friends.
As described above, youth in squatter settlements who attend secondary education create their self-image not only through friends from squatter settlements (who drop out of primary education and drink and smoke, or who do not attend school and are only engaged in household chores) but also through the middle-class families and friends with whom they connect at school and cram school. However, they are not able to fully embody their perceived self-image because of differences between themselves and their reference points.
This paper depicts aspects of the current perceptions and prospects of young people who have attended the Delhi Government-run secondary schools or the NIOS, focusing on their perceived self-image. Secondary education in Delhi is characterised by a low pass rate in grade 9, a highly selective stage of education based on academic performance, compared with primary education, which lacks a retention mechanism. The young people in the case studies outlined in this paper were at the secondary level. The youth that participated in this study would be referred to as either ‘failures’ (Nawani 2018) or ‘halfways’ (Sasaki 2010) from the perspective of the academic qualifications geared towards advancement in higher education and the acquisition of employment opportunities. Youth living in squatter settlements, however, can create the perceived self-image they want and the self-image they should have in alignment with the courses they can choose in secondary education, the grades they have completed, and their academic qualifications (i.e., their attendance at schools frequented by children from middle-class neighbourhoods). Therefore, this study differs from the studies that highlight the importance of obtaining academic qualifications and show the significance of academic qualifications from the perspective of the youth themselves. In addition to academic qualifications, secondary education provides youth in squatter settlements with access to friendships crucial for forming their self-image. These academic qualifications and the friends they connect with in the secondary school setting become essential reference points in the presence of out-of-school friends, girls in squatter settlements engaged only in domestic chores, and parents who have their preferred images of the youth.
Youth in squatter settlements are exposed to and adopt lifestyles shared by their secondary school friends, especially those from higher economic and social classes. This is consistent with previous Indian youth studies that have found that youth seek integration into world-class urban spaces permeated by consumer culture (Nisbett 2007). However, youth in squatter settlements do not seek to be integrated with those ‘appropriate’ for the city by temporarily hiding their origins and position as residents of squatter settlements (see Zabiliūté 2016; Branagan 2020), who are not considered ‘appropriate’ for a world-class urban image (Ghertner 2015). Rather, incorporating the lifestyles of friends they met at school or cram schools is an important element in the youth’s efforts to realise the self-image they want. This is because birthday parties, the English language, not smoking, and discussing studies and movies, smartphones and YouTube videos, and popular singers and songs are all vital elements that embody the self-image perceived by youth residing in squatter settlements.
However, the practices of these youth are perceived as different from those of friends they connect with in their secondary education experiences, even if they adopt similar lifestyles. The experience of recognising differences is accompanied by the experience of recognising a self that cannot be as good as the ‘good’ friends who do not touch alcohol; the experience of recognising that when open school is closed, one returns to being engaged only in household chores like the ‘slum girls’; and the experience of always borrowing friends’ smartphones to watch videos. However, the experience of difference does not mean that the youth in squatter settlements are pessimistic or embody a sense of being left out of society (see Jeffrey 2010). They are also different from optimistic figures who enjoy chatting and playing games with their friends (see Nisbett 2007; Rangaswamy and Cutrell 2012). The dichotomous cognitive framework of pessimism and optimism oversimplifies the reality of these young people. In the process of realising their perceived self-image, they live their lives by looking at the possibilities and limitations of their perceived self-image, just as they are aware of the differences between themselves and their middle-class friends in secondary and cram schools.
What emerges from the above-mentioned images of youth in squatter settlements attending secondary education is that secondary education, even if it is an inadequate resource for entering higher education (see Sasaki 2010; Nawani 2018), is an opportunity to cultivate a self-image based on realistic possibilities and limitations. Importantly, this self-image is connected to young people’s aspirations. Arjun Appadurai mentioned that, whereas the privileged in a society frequently and realistically explore their aspirations using the norms of their society, the poor have fewer opportunities to navigate their aspirations or alternative futures. Consequently, they ‘have a more brittle horizon of aspirations’ (Appadurai 2004: 69). Appadurai demonstrated this navigational capacity, but did not indicate how to cultivate this capacity. In this context, the opportunity for youth in squatter settlements to cultivate a self-image through secondary education and schools is based on interactions with different social classes. Accordingly, they can recognise realistic possibilities and limitations. Therefore, this opportunity can be regarded as one of the foundations on which youth in squatter settlements with specific origins and positions can navigate their aspirations. If they can cultivate this navigational capacity to aspire through the experience of secondary education and achieve their desired future, they will be role models in the squatter settlements.
I would like to thank all my friends in Delhi, who kindly supported my research. And I am grateful for the comments and suggestions from two referees. This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP20K13292 and JP23K01032.
1 The gross enrolment ratio in India in 2020–21, was 103.3% for primary education, 92.2% for upper primary education, 79.8% for secondary education, and 53.8% for senior secondary education (GoI 2022). Furthermore, the gross enrolment ratio for higher education stood at 27.1%, as reported in the 2019–20 survey (GoI 2020).
2 As of 2019, India’s population pyramid exhibited a bell-shaped structure. The percentage of young people aged 15–24, the same age as the individuals featured in this paper’s cases, comprised approximately 18% of the total population. This percentage is the highest among all age groups. https://www.populationpyramid.net (accessed 20 May 2022).
3 In 1986, the National Policy on Education recommended strengthening the Open School System to broaden learning opportunities at the secondary level gradually. In response, the Ministry of Human Resource and Development (now the Ministry of Education) established the National Open School in 1989, later renamed the NIOS in 2002. NIOS has been instrumental in offering continuing education opportunities for children, including school dropouts and those who have completed nonformal education. Its missions include universalising education, increasing equality and justice in society, and cultivating a culture of lifelong learning. https://nios.ac.in/about-us/profile.aspx (accessed 28 February 2024).
4 Appadurai indicated that ‘aspirations are never simply individual (as the language of wants and choices inclines us to think). They are always formed in interaction and in the thick of social life’ (Appadurai 2004: 67).
5 The 36 scheduled castes in Delhi are officially recognised by The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Lists (Modification) Order of 1956. http://www.tribal.gov.in/WriteReadData/userfiles/file/3%20-%20Act%20No%2063%20of%201956.pdf (accessed 8 August 2016).
6 The rupee values shown in this paper are the values as of 2014. According to the Labour Commissioner, Government of NCT of Delhi, the minimum wage in the unskilled category was Rs. 8,632 monthly in October 2014. https://labour.delhi.gov.in/labour/minimum-wages-rates-glance (accessed 27 February 2024).
7 Both J and B schools have grades 6–12 for boys and nursery to 12 for girls. Although B school has only Hindi-medium classes, J school has both Hindi-medium and English-medium classes so that J school is popular for providing ‘good’ education among the residents of the W area.
8 Circular (Subject: Chunauti－2018: New Academic Plan to Support Class IX). http://edudel.nic.in/upload_2015_16/230_dt_29062016.pdf (accessed 10 March 2020).
9 A young man, whose father died of illness soon after he entered secondary school and had to work to make ends meet, replied, ‘Any job is a good job for me as long as I can earn money’. Another young man, who left school at the primary level and worked as a truck driver for a moving company at the time of the study, said, ‘I do not need education to get a job. As long as I have thumbs, I will be fine’. In this context, ‘thumb’ refers to the fact that illiterate people stamp their thumbprints on contracts.
