Wet Histories

Consisting of a complex of hazardous port-related industries and marginalised populations, Mumbai’s east coast was first produced as a site for furthering British imperial designs and later Indian nationalist ambitions. More recent government interventions seek to (re)value this industrial landscape through new infrastructure that prioritises marine logistics, real estate development and ecotourism.

Both these imaginaries of the east coast are founded on capitalist projects of land reclamation that ‘forget’ its watery history. They also cast aside those who inhabit the coast differently, such as the indigenous fishing community of Kolis. Yet numerous fishing villages of the Kolis hug the city’s coast, revealing older, now forgotten, traditions of inhabitation based on ‘living amidst wetness’.

This talk foregrounds their stories to help recover worlds that relate to the movement, relations and knowledge mediated by water as opposed to land, pollution and propertied ownership. Dwelling in these wet stories might urge new dialogues and public action to address current environmental crises and reclaim other ways of being for Coast and City. A Q&A with the audience will follow.