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On June 19, 2026, the Supreme Court recognized the right to walk on demarcated and well-maintained footpaths as a fundamental right. It also directed the government to introduce a law that declares this right and to set up a regulatory body to implement it. The judgment came in a case involving the death of a five-year-old boy hit by a truck on his way to school. The judgment acknowledges walking not just as a means of transport, but as a practice with deep historical, social and political meanings in the Indian context, with our rich tapestry of religious practices and political movements where walking has been central to our social-political lives. Furthermore, the judgment explicitly mentions “The fundamental right to walk on demarcated footpaths shall override the privilege of a motorized vehicle.”
Despite a progressive judgment on the rights of pedestrians, there are concerns that the resulting law will be used to disproportionately target the poor, specifically, roadside hawkers and pavement dwellers. Such a judgment inevitably opens up public discourse on who has the right over public land and who is considered an “encroacher” over it. In the article, I argue that the legal and administrative understanding of ‘encroachments’ has been classist in nature. Further, to secure the right to walk on footpaths, the state must discard such double standards and intentionally privilege the rights of pedestrians over those of the motorized vehicle.
There is sufficient historical precedent to show the double standards with which courts and state agencies view and manage ‘encroachments’ on public land. Take the case of the Mahipalpur Ridge in New Delhi, wherein the SC allowed the construction of hotels, malls, and office buildings on forest land while demarcating all surrounding areas for biodiversity conservation. For this purpose, several slums considered as encroachments were cleared, and the local community lost access to these lands, which they used for cattle grazing and fuelwood collection. Similarly, in June 2021, at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the SC ordered the demolition of more than 5,000 houses in Khori Basti, a 170-acre low-income settlement at the Delhi-Haryana border, effectively displacing 10,000 families.
Most of the residents had migrated into the area in the 1990s as mine workers and had bought their plots through local real estate agents. While the Faridabad Municipal Corporation demolished the houses of thousands of such families deemed encroachers on forest land, it left the farmhouses, malls, hotels, and other commercial structures on such land untouched. Thus, encroachment on forest land by elite actors continues unabated, while the judiciary and state machinery exclusively penalize encroachment by low-income groups, who often have no other viable options for housing and livelihoods.
In the landmark case Olga Tellis v. Bombay Municipal Corporation (1985), the slum and pavement dwellers of Bombay challenged their planned eviction. In its judgment, the Supreme Court recognized two sets of entitlements as part of the right to housing: the right to notice and hearing before evictions and the right to rehabilitation under existing schemes. However, it failed to provide any meaningful material relief to the slum-dwellers. Instead, the court ordered their removal on the grounds that no one has the right to use public property for private purposes without authorization and that the public’s right to use pavements for passage takes precedence over the slum dwellers’ claim to occupy them.
Yet, the same state that evicts pavement dwellers with great zeal has turned a blind eye to a much larger occupant of public space: the parked car. Planners typically account for 23 sq. m. of land for parking an average-sized car. According to CSE’s analysis in 2009, in the business district of Connaught Place in New Delhi, the rent of such an area could be as high as Rs 36,000 per month. Cars and their associated parking needs raise serious questions of spatial equality in cities like New Delhi. While cars remain parked for 90-95% of their lifecycle and occupy over 10% of the city’s land area, the entire slum population of Delhi occupies only 3%, with low-income housing for a family unit being built under 25-40 sq. m. Added to this is the rapid rise in SUV ownership across India, which has triggered the demand for even larger parking spaces, well beyond the average 23 sq. m.
Lines of parked cars blocking entire lanes on main roads and footpaths are a familiar sight in affluent residential and business districts in cities across India. Not only does on-street parking hinder pedestrians’ rights, but it has also proven to be a major impediment to the implementation and maintenance of cycling tracks and dedicated bus lanes intended to improve and decarbonize our mobility systems. While cities have built multi-level paid parking infrastructure, they remain heavily underutilized due to the availability of free, unchecked on-street parking on Indian roads.
Therefore, the rising number of cars on Indian roads and their unchecked entitlement to public space pose a real threat to realizing our fundamental right to footpaths. In line with the Supreme Court’s judgement, there has to be an explicit policy recognition of the rights of pedestrians to well-maintained, unencumbered footpaths over that of cars. This will require rigorous parking management, pedestrian-centric neighborhood planning, and the political will to enforce these rights on the ground.
Disclaimer: The opinions and views expressed in this article/column are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of South Asian Herald.
