For decades now, the proliferation of urban slums across South Asia has inspired dialogue and debate around granting property rights to slum-dwellers. It is a controversial issue. Migrants move to cities like Mumbai, Karachi, Dhaka and Kathmandu seeking better fortunes for themselves and their families, but the price of such a move is to settle unofficially at the periphery of formal city life. The cost of living in the city is too high for new city arrivals and the poor are forced to create makeshift homes. Because the urban poor are not recognized as legitimate city residents, their tenure is insecure, and they are at the whim of local authorities that can raze their homes and businesses with little notice or consideration for what effect such actions may have on the poor’s lives and livelihoods. No matter how long the poor have lived on the same grounds, they lack any rights to property.