Secrets of the Smoke 07: Smoking City

And the new smokeless rocket stoves of Aarey Milk Colony

Nov 23, 2024

While our eyes burn just from seeing the smoke and dust that citizens in Delhi and Northern India breathe, we are acutely aware of the deteriorating air quality in our seaside city. Although much of what we breathe comes from vehicle exhaust, construction dust, and emissions from refineries and power stations, a significant amount also comes from wood-fired smoke in this city of piped cooking gas.

Before we enter Aarey, let’s smoke.

The most visible chimneys belong to the bakeries that produce our favourite pavs and breads, many of which still rely on wood-fired ovens. Additionally, thousands of households and commercial kitchens in this city of informal housing and businesses prefer the cheaper wood-fired stoves over the more expensive LPG cylinders. Wood for cooking, both for commercial use and domestic purposes, is a flourishing trade. The supply comes from trees felled in the city, repurposed packaging material, and deadwood collected from forests and mangroves.

Collecting wood from the edge of the mangroves

Most bakeries in Mumbai burn wood as fuel.

A ‘Charcoal Depot’ in Mumbai. Most older localities have one.

Cowdung cakes drying on the walls of the city.

Inside a milk farm in Aarey Colony, the workers prefer to use cow dung cakes as fuel.

Wood is preferred to electricity or gas for cremation by most communities.

A typical wood stove in a Aarey colony pada.

SMOKE. LESS.

In Aarey.

In earlier Secrets of the Smoke stories, we travelled north to Palghar District to visit the homes of the indigenous tribes with Nitisha. Mumbai’s hilly areas are part of the same terrain, and one of the original inhabitants of this Island City is related to the same tribes as those in Palghar.

This week, we visit the tribal Aarey Milk Colony, home to several padas (settlements) that may even predate the city. These communities live on the edge of both the urban sprawl and the forest.

The city as seen from inside Aarey colony.

Their primary cooking fuel is wood gathered from the forest or within their padas. Nitisha of the Smokeless Cookstove Foundation is leading a group of young women from various padas who are installing Smokeless rocket cookstoves in homes in Aarey Colony. The idea is to use this stove that burns wood thoroughly to reduce smoke and the quantity of wood required to produce more energy, reducing the time women spend collecting firewood, lowering costs and frees women from breathing toxic smoke.