In yet another stark example of how elderly citizens are left helpless in the city of dreams, 72-year-old widow Shakuntala S Mishra lives each day in fear — not of death, but of the crumbling ceiling above her head and walls that develop new cracks each day. A resident of a dangerously dilapidated pagadi building named Pai Building in the Parekh Estate at Charni Road, Mishra’s situation sheds light on the growing plight of thousands of tenants trapped in the cracks of an outdated rental system and apathetic landlords.

Speaking with mid-day from her dimly lit one-room home, Mishra recounted her growing anxiety as chunks of plaster continue to fall from the ceiling. “Every night, I sleep close to the wall so I may have a chance to survive if the ceiling collapses,” she says with a weak smile. With no children or close relatives to support her in the city, she depends on the money that her sister sends from Delhi every month. But even her deep-rooted resilience falters in the face of a decaying structure and an unyielding landlord who, according to her and other tenants, has flatly refused both redevelopment and the option to sell.

“I’ve lived here since I was born in 1952. My husband passed away in 2016. I stayed on because this was home — until the cracks began to show. Now, even the walls groan,” she says, pointing to a long zigzag fracture across her room’s ceiling.