OLD DELHI

Old Delhi is essentially a muslim area. Its interior is home to the largest and most important mosque in India, of the suni hanafi tradition. It is an important spiritual center and culminates a grand commercial network. In this district, individuals of different religions and communities cohabit and come and go to their Hindu, Sikh, and Jain sanctuaries. This zone is a big market of wholesalers differentiated in sectors by guilds and positions.

 In the spring of 2010, I was in India to carry out a project about the social minorities, the lower castes of India and eunuchs. The project was developed, in part, in the streets of Old Delhi. It speaks of the solitude and the abandonment of the lower castes that live in this urban area of India suffer in delirium. The Dalit or Avarna (Untouchables) are considered to be of the lowest social standing. In theory, the law recognizes their rights but in reality they suffer the largest margin of social degradation in Indian society and occupy the posts that are considered most impure. The Adivasis are the settlers of tribal origin from the rural areas, that now live in miserable conditions in the larger cities, destitute of their lands and traditions. The majority of these groups survive in the streets of the most important cities in India, piled up in the slums, confused between the magna of people where they mix with religion, drugs and prostitution. Their evident condition of ''miserables'' unites them, sunken in the bottom of the social framework of castes.