“Which came first? The houses or the fort?” Chandravati poses the question rhetorically, with a smile. “There are no problems here. All is well. Government workers visit us every month, asking about problems and helping with solutions.”

Chandravati lives in Vikram Colony, a refugee settlement with a uniquely complex legal standing owing to its proximity to Feroz Shah Kotla, the 14th-century fortress and Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) protected monument in Delhi. Electrical transmission lines run along the fort’s walls. Towering houses border its perimeter. Residents here live in a hazard-prone state, aware that a single heavy spell of rain can flood the roads, clog the drains, and send sparks flying from exposed wires.

The regularisation of illegal settlements in the national capital has been a politically charged issue for decades, gaining traction each election season. Acting on a long-standing electoral promise, the Delhi government announced that it will regularise 1,511 of the city’s 1,731 unauthorised colonies on an “as is, where is” basis. Under this framework, the government will recognise each colony in its current physical condition without mandating modifications to existing infrastructure.

The changes are being introduced through amendments to the 2019 Regulations under the National Capital Territory of Delhi (Recognition of Property Rights of Residents in Unauthorised Colonies) Act, 2019, which governs the Pradhan Mantri–Unauthorised Colonies in Delhi Awas Adhikar Yojana (PM-UDAY). By adopting the “as is where is” framework, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has removed the mandatory requirement for colony-wide layout plans—previously the principal bottleneck for individual ownership rights. Other changes include an administrative shift from the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) to the Revenue Department, aimed at expediting the processing of sale deeds through a decentralised model.

Chief Minister Rekha Gupta and Union Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs Manohar Lal Khattar detailed the initiative at a press conference on April 7. These colonies, which existed as of June 1, 2014, and met a 50 per cent built-up threshold by January 1, 2015, represent a large segment of the city’s population. Nearly 45 lakh residents stand to benefit from simplified ownership norms. The plan excludes 69 affluent colonies and “restricted areas”, including reserved or notified forests, the Yamuna flood plain, and land protected under existing laws.

While PM-UDAY was launched in 2019, progress has been slow. As of March 31, 2026, only about 40,000 conveyance deeds and authorisation slips had been issued. A former bureaucrat who requested anonymity said, “This is all politics. Everything starts accumulating when there is a visible dividend.”

Jacob Manohar, Town and Country Planner at MoHUA, said safety remains the priority. The focus, he said, is on structural and social density. “More than widening of lanes, how many residents reside in the household, the number of people living in one household and the number of floors are important considerations,” he said.

Professor Bandana Jha from the School of Planning and Architecture (SPA) said the policy addresses a deep-seated urban crisis. Delhi’s planning is made complex by the size of its migrant population and the divide between peripheral urban villages and settled colonies, she said. “There are a lot of problems with roads, drainage networks and water supply in these areas, and the problem arises because budgetary allocations cannot be given to these colonies until they are regularised,” she said.

Exclusions and risks

Technological changes are central to the new approach. Manual mapping has been replaced by geospatial surveys. Arathy Gopal, Assistant Professor at SPA, said GIS mapping uses both satellite imagery and drones and offers greater precision. On the exclusion of restricted areas, she said regularisation could serve as a check against unsustainable construction. “More construction in environmentally sensitive areas and heritage sites is not ecologically sound. It would cause critical damage to these areas,” she said.

The Yamuna River belt remains a significant point of exclusion. Jha said the risk to life posed to residents living along the river is too great. “It will be fatal to regularise those areas,” she said, adding that flooding worsened by climate change justifies the exclusion. The former bureaucrat, meanwhile, questioned whether sewage connectivity was even a consideration for the present government and added: “It is not easy to regularise because documents are needed, but keeping people politically happy and appeasing the seven million vote-bank who live there will help with the motivation to achieve the aim.”

The exclusion of affluent colonies has drawn criticism from the opposition. Jasmine Shah, a senior leader of AAP, said: “This is where they earn their maximum money.” He questioned the role of local authorities: “What were DDA and MCD [Municipal Corporation of Delhi] doing all this time? There is only mala fide that one can make from this.” Shah also alleged that these affluent areas remain sites of illegal rent-seeking supported by residents.

Senior BJP leader Vijay Goel told Frontline that affluent colonies were excluded because the value of land is greater in these areas. He cited the Supreme Court’s inquiry in 2025 into why authorities were shielding illegal structures built by the wealthy in areas such as Sainik Farms. The court questioned the misuse of the PM-UDAY scheme to protect affluent non-conforming structures rather than poorer ones. Goel said the “as is where is” approach has “ended the tension of people” in the selected areas and will ease the procurement of loans.

The digital divide and the price of delay

Goel said participation was previously low because the scheme was under the DDA. “It was reported to us that the people in DDA were not working well and there was corruption,” he said, adding that transferring management to the MCD and State Revenue Department should improve results. He raised concerns about future enforcement, however: “The government will have to become much stricter now,” as many of the same officers remain in place. He also noted that the policy is silent on colonies that may be built after the cutoff. Frontline reached out to the DDA for a statement, but no response was received at the time of publication.

Continuing with the “triple-engine sarkar” pitch, Rekha Gupta said while announcing the plan that the State and Central governments will work together. Jasmine Shah labelled the government a “jumlon ki sarkaar” (government of false promises). “There is absolutely no intention towards bettering conditions of the people,” he said, pointing out that the State had recently taken a Rs. 20,000 crore loan to finance schemes, even as Gupta announced an Rs. 800 crore allocation for PM-UDAY.

Critics have questioned whether Rs. 800 crore for 1,511 colonies—roughly Rs. 53 lakh per colony—is sufficient for long-term infrastructure improvements. Jacob Manohar said the allocation was well considered, as the major share that previously went toward the purchase of land is now being regularised as legal property of the State. “You are calculating the budget for development only, the land value is a resource that is already included,” he said. “This is a self-financing project.”

Shah also pointed out that many residents lack smartphones to navigate the digital portal. Goel dismissed this concern. “Everyone has a mobile or access to someone who has a device today. People find ways to claim benefits,” he said, adding, “Children are very intelligent today and everyone is educated in these colonies.”

As the MCD’s SWAGAM portal opens on April 24, the promise of legal status runs up against the realities of cost and digital access, since registration and document filing are wholly digitised. Manohar suggested involving a third party to act as a mediator between the government and residents. Shah cited AAP’s doorstep delivery of services scheme, which facilitated online processes at the residence of the beneficiary for a nominal charge of Rs 50. “It was an excellent initiative until the L-G stopped it,” he said.

The government has said no homes will be demolished for failure to register. But properties that remain outside the system are functionally frozen. Without regularisation, they cannot be used as collateral for loans, and any renovation remains illegal without MCD approval. The State has also introduced a financial incentive to register promptly: application charges on the portal will increase by 8 per cent every year. For applications filed after March 31, 2023, charges were updated from Rs. 5,775 to Rs. 6,699, and now stand to rise by 8 per cent annually.

When asked how construction continues in Vikram Colony, which lies in the “prohibited zone” within 100 metres of Feroz Shah Kotla, Arif, a resident, said, “Who is here to stop us? Those who want to build will build. No one has ever stopped it.”

For the millions living in Delhi’s unauthorised settlements, regularisation is a contest between bureaucratic process and an ever-rising price tag for the right to belong to the city. The State’s attempt to digitise the informal faces a population that has always moved faster than the law—and a city where the electorate has long been favoured over the rules that are supposed to govern it.

Aparna Vats is an intern with Frontline

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