Celine Dcruz

Celine D’Cruz is a founding member of Slum Dwellers International (SDI), where she has focused on strengthening local federations through community savings initiatives and the collection of data on informal settlements. Her work supports organized communities in negotiating for land, housing, and basic infrastructure. She began her work in Mumbai with pavement dwellers, supporting their organization, savings groups, and efforts to secure tenure and housing.

She has played a key role in planning and convening international forums that bring slum dwellers into dialogue with policymakers and city authorities. She actively participated in the United Nations Campaign for Secure Tenure in India, the Philippines, South Africa, and Namibia, engaging with poor communities, municipal agencies, government authorities, UN bodies, and bilateral partners.

In 2003–2004, she was a World Fellow at Yale University and later spent six months as a Visiting Fellow at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) in London. She has written on urban poor movements and city development in the Global South.

From 2009–2010, she worked with Cities Alliance at the World Bank in Washington, D.C.