Question

what are "chawls"?describe their structure and give a small description about them.

Answer 1

A chawl was a multi-storeyed structure. They were generally owned by private landlords.
Each chawl was divided into smaller one-room tenements, which had no private toilets
People were forced to share a tenement with relatives or caste fellows due to high rents.

Homes were small streets so the neighbourhoods became the place for various activities like cooking washing and sleeping.
Liquor shops and akharas came up in any empty spot. Street entertainers and hawkers also used those empty spaces.

People from the lower castes found it difficult to find housing. These people were kept out of many chawls.
They often had to live in shelters made of corrugated sheets, leaves or bamboo poles.