The odd H-shaped sprawling Datta Mandir Wadi in Girgaon is among the 80-odd chawls, which stands the test of time in an era of real estate makeovers. It is not that its residents—65 residential units and 17 commercial establishments split into three wings—haven’t been approached by builders with a redevelopment plan. But the inhabitants haven’t yet arrived at a consensus over carpet area allocations and other math of a particularly zigzag 2,185 sqm plot.  Thanks to the presence of  three temples, which cannot be touched because of their religious significance—Dakshinmukhi Hanuman Mandir, Swayambhu Datta Mandir as well as Shiva Mandir, no builder has as yet drawn up a renovation plan for the chawl. These non-movable deities have so far stopped the redevelopment of the chawl cluster built in 1872. 

“We call it the curious case of Datta Mandir Wadi. We feel our chawl cluster is beyond valuation,” says Mihir Vaidya, a resident who just presented his graduate programme thesis titled, Reintegrating Chawl Culture in the New Development of Girgaon. A student of the IES College of Architecture in Bandra, currently pursuing Masters in Urban Design at School of Planning and Architecture in New Delhi, Vaidya declares at the beginning of his academic dissertation that he intends to study the typology of chawls—derived from chaals in Marathi—as a form of social affordable housing, which once defined the migrant-working class accommodation in Mumbai, particularly the “inner city” of Girgaon.