“I make Rs 10,000 through household chores and cooking, of which I pay rent of Rs 4,000 for a single room. Sometimes it gets difficult to put food on the table,” says Sumitra, a mother of two living in Delhi’s Sangam Vihar. Two years ago, she paid Rs 3,000 for the same room – a bare-bones, sparsely furnished space that doubles as both her living and kitchen area. Her husband, a labourer in Noida, visits the family on weekends.
