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Introduction
Cybermohalla began in 2001, with the activation, in LNJP colony, an informal settlement, of a one room space as a lab with basic technology of three Linux operated computers, a dictaphone, a still camera and 15 young practitioners, between the ages 15 and 20 years, from the locality. The idea was that if the space can draw a relation between writing, researching, experimenting, and tap into different forms of knowledge, modes of cultural expression and infrastructures of circulation of these within the neighbourhood, then it will be able to build new grounds of knowledge.
Over the years, this experiment has evolved into a network of locality labs in different settlements. (LNJP – 2001, Dakshinpuri – 2002, Nangla – 2004 to 2006). A vast range of practices have evolved at these labs – writing and listening to one another daily (on memories, conversations, observations, own journeys, journeys of people, biographies, logs of the daily, etc); reading; recording conversations in the neighbourhood about daily life and journeys into the city; collecting printed materials (flyers, pamphlets, cards, calendars etc); engaging with the different forms of writing in the locality (from personal diaries, letters received and archived by someone, cuttings from old newspapers and magazines preserved by someone as a scrap book, bills, documents, etc); building conversations with people who have textual practices in the locality (poets, diarists, story tellers, someone who collects materials, someone who visits libraries, printers and binders).
Through these, and a host of other practices evolved in these nodes, it becomes possible for each node to build a dense vocabulary and relational world of ideas and concepts. It is into this that newer practitioners are invited, and older practitioners who may have left to work, eg, sometimes return to share their writings. Within the neighbourhoods, 400 young people have passed through the labs, each having practiced at the labs from between a few weeks to a few years. At any given point of time, there are around 25 practitioners in each lab, and a group of 20 older practitioners (with an experience of between five and seven years at the labs) has emerged.
About the neighbourhoods
LNJP is an informal settlement that grew on a half cemetry, half dumping ground in the late '60s, and now has grown into a settlement of over 60,000 people from the East and the North. An account of the neighbourhood is available in one of the CM publications. (Listen to a soundscape).
Dakshinpuri is a post-emergency resettlement colony of over 400,000 inhabitants from different informal settlements in Delhi who were forcefully relocated here in the late '70s. It is presently under deep transformation due to enforcement of the urban plan and high end real estate developments in the neighbouring areas.
Nangla Maanchi was one of the largest settlements on the bank of the river Yamuna, transformed from a fly ash deposit into a lively settlement by its inhabitants. Nangla was demolished in 2006 to make way for the new Riverfront, and some of the settlers have been relocated to Ghevra on the far North of the city. See blogs by the practitioners, in Hindi and translations into English.
Ghevra is a resettlement colony still in formation, where twenty settlements will be relocated in the near future. Cybermohalla practitioners have shifted to Ghevra to search and set up fresh terms of engagement in this new corner of the city.
Writings on the locality labs
Some questions through which we think about a lab, July 2006
Flashback! by Yashoda Singh and Lakhmi Chand Kohli, January 2005 (In Hindi/हिंदी में)
Our Own Space by Neelofar, May 2004
Readings at the launch of the publication, Book Box, October 2003
What is Cybermohalla by Shamsher Ali
About the Compughar, Babli Rai
On Thinking (Edges of Questions) by Raju Singh
Over the years, this experiment has evolved into a network of locality labs in different settlements. (LNJP – 2001, Dakshinpuri – 2002, Nangla – 2004 to 2006). A vast range of practices have evolved at these labs – writing and listening to one another daily (on memories, conversations, observations, own journeys, journeys of people, biographies, logs of the daily, etc); reading; recording conversations in the neighbourhood about daily life and journeys into the city; collecting printed materials (flyers, pamphlets, cards, calendars etc); engaging with the different forms of writing in the locality (from personal diaries, letters received and archived by someone, cuttings from old newspapers and magazines preserved by someone as a scrap book, bills, documents, etc); building conversations with people who have textual practices in the locality (poets, diarists, story tellers, someone who collects materials, someone who visits libraries, printers and binders).
Through these, and a host of other practices evolved in these nodes, it becomes possible for each node to build a dense vocabulary and relational world of ideas and concepts. It is into this that newer practitioners are invited, and older practitioners who may have left to work, eg, sometimes return to share their writings. Within the neighbourhoods, 400 young people have passed through the labs, each having practiced at the labs from between a few weeks to a few years. At any given point of time, there are around 25 practitioners in each lab, and a group of 20 older practitioners (with an experience of between five and seven years at the labs) has emerged.
About the neighbourhoods
LNJP is an informal settlement that grew on a half cemetry, half dumping ground in the late '60s, and now has grown into a settlement of over 60,000 people from the East and the North. An account of the neighbourhood is available in one of the CM publications. (Listen to a soundscape).
Dakshinpuri is a post-emergency resettlement colony of over 400,000 inhabitants from different informal settlements in Delhi who were forcefully relocated here in the late '70s. It is presently under deep transformation due to enforcement of the urban plan and high end real estate developments in the neighbouring areas.
Nangla Maanchi was one of the largest settlements on the bank of the river Yamuna, transformed from a fly ash deposit into a lively settlement by its inhabitants. Nangla was demolished in 2006 to make way for the new Riverfront, and some of the settlers have been relocated to Ghevra on the far North of the city. See blogs by the practitioners, in Hindi and translations into English.
Ghevra is a resettlement colony still in formation, where twenty settlements will be relocated in the near future. Cybermohalla practitioners have shifted to Ghevra to search and set up fresh terms of engagement in this new corner of the city.
Writings on the locality labs
Some questions through which we think about a lab, July 2006
Flashback! by Yashoda Singh and Lakhmi Chand Kohli, January 2005 (In Hindi/हिंदी में)
Our Own Space by Neelofar, May 2004
Readings at the launch of the publication, Book Box, October 2003
What is Cybermohalla by Shamsher Ali
About the Compughar, Babli Rai
On Thinking (Edges of Questions) by Raju Singh