Indore (Madhya Pradesh): The civic administration’s grand promises of making Indore a ‘beggar-free’ city seem to be a distant dream. The district administration, Indore Municipal Corporation and the Women and Child Development Department took up the task of making the city beggar-free again about a week ago.

Despite the ambitious claims, the reality on the ground paints a different picture. Beggars continue to be found on every street and square, underscoring the ongoing challenges that undermine the city’s efforts to achieve this goal. In 2020, the Indore administration launched a mission that promised to redefine the city’s image.

They made a joint commitment to make the city beggar-free, but failed to deliver on their promise. The goal was to make the city beggar-free within a month. However, four years after the promise, the reality is different. The vision of a beggar-free Indore has still not become a reality. Walking through the city’s squares, it is clear that beggars are still a part of the city.

The town’s residents had hoped that the town would soon see no more alms. But now they are disillusioned. “We were told that the situation would improve, that the beggars would be rehabilitated and would have a new chance at life,” says a local shopkeeper.

“But nothing has changed. Every day we see the same faces in the same places asking for help.” The programs designed to help the beggars were poorly implemented, plagued by bureaucratic delays and a lack of adequate resources. Some initiatives were launched with great enthusiasm but quickly lost momentum.

As the city continues to grapple with this problem, the dream of a beggar-free Indore is becoming increasingly distant. Collector Asheesh Singh explained his strategy at a recent meeting. He mentioned that as per a departmental order, the city is currently allowed to rescue beggars in groups of not more than 50 people at a time.

However, he stressed that the city has asked the ministry to increase this limit to make the process more efficient. In addition, the authorities are working on a more targeted approach to combat the problem. The plan is to categorize beggars by age and gender, such as begging children, the elderly, women and men, and then focus on systematic rescue and rehabilitation of each group.

Mayor Pushyamitra Bhargav says the civic body will intensify its efforts to create a beggar-free city and send the beggars to a rehabilitation centre. Ramniwas Budholiya, deputy director of the Integrated Child Protection Programme, says, “We are working towards this goal and will take action soon.”