'TRACK’ING THE BORDER: MICRO-GEOGRAPHIES OF INFRASTRUCTURAL BORDERS IN GUWAHATI INDIA

Abstract

This thesis investigates micro-urban spaces within cities where geopolitical processes at different scales intersect, producing layers of bordering, that become legible through people-infrastructure interactions. I specifically explore the reproduction India’s partition and the immigration debate in Assam within the city of Guwahati, the largest city of Northeast India, making it an urban frontier where border-dynamics play out. Engaging with the materialities and imaginaries of fractured infrastructure in the locality of Silpukhuri in the frontier city, this thesis argues that local urban spaces within frontier cities are where the most concentrated experiences of bordering are located. The thesis examines two types of infrastructures- railways that intersect and divide the locality, and circulatory water infrastructure that produce borders that are fluid and contextual. By highlighting the importance of micro-urban sites within cities that are at the intersection of wider processes, my thesis speaks to the debates on planetary urbanization.