‘Aao, Jagah Banaye’ is a call for action to include and empower women vendor groups within the urban informal sector to re-imagine, reclaim and further co-create their places of work. Urban planners Saleha Sapra & Riddhi Batra explore how patriarchy is systemically entrenched in cultural practices as well as in women’s vending (work) space. Even though informal vending is a crucial part of the urban economy, such practices are not supported by the state in terms of infrastructure, place-making, or capacity-building. How then, does feminist practice manifest in city-making? How can we collectively co-create the urban realm to include non-male genders? Through ‘Aao, Jagah Banaye’ they aim to work with resource-poor women vendor groups in Raghubir Nagar who have been impacted by spatial injustice in the form of everyday vulnerabilities. They hope to enable a shift from dependency to autonomy in the public realm across parameters of accessibility, safety, and comfort, to amplify everyday stories of navigating the public realm through engaged art practices, and to shift Delhi’s urban environment to a place of dignity and safety for its citizens.

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