The Housing Discrimination Project (HDP) is a three-year empirical research on urban rental housing discrimination in India. The Project uses rigorous ethnographic techniques to record the prevalence of rental housing discrimination, and theorize its mechanisms, modalities and impact. It focuses on discrimination against Muslims with the purpose of also generating tools to analyze the condition of other social groups. HDP aims to intervene in various policy, legal and academic debates, including marginalization of minorities, urban governance, studies in discrimination and exclusion, and socio-economic rights.

HDP has focused on in-depth case studies in Delhi and Mumbai. In its phase I (July 2016—June 2017) in Delhi, the Project mapped the existence, causes, and the systemic character of rental discrimination. It did so by highlighting the specific processes that guide rental access and locating religious discrimination within these existing modes of rental access. The on-going phase II (August 2017—May 2018) addresses the question of access and exclusion in the Delhi rental market. Phase III of the Project will focus on rental discrimination and exclusion in Mumbai.

HDP is a field-research driven interdisciplinary project that has drawn researchers from diverse academic and professional backgrounds, ranging from law, psychology, sociology, human rights, and urban studies.

Phase I of HDP was partly supported by the Peter and Patricia Gruber Fellowship in Global Justice and Women’s Rights (2016-2017) and was based out of the Centre for Equity Studies, New Delhi. Phases II and III are supported by the Azim Premji Foundation and are based out of the Centre for Public Interest Law, Jindal Global Law School.