India's railway slumdogs: Shanty town where children play on tracks while their parents cook in shelters just feet from speeding trains
- Astonishing pictures show a slum in India where children play on an active rail line and regularly dodge trains
- Built on the tracks, their parents cook and clean in makeshift bamboo huts constructed beside the rail lines
- Despite the country's economic boom, 360 million people in India continue to live in similarly squalid conditions
While India's economy continues to boom, its 360million poorest citizens remain among some of the most impoverished in the world.
Now these astonishing pictures - of a community living amid the dangers of an active train track - reveal the country's slum conditions at their worst.
Incredibly, children play on the tracks throughout the day and do their best to step aside whenever a train whistles by.
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A train rushes past a group of children playing football on the train tracks amid the community's washing and rubbish
Two children hug each
A train passes dangerously close to an impoverished elderly woman in the slum in Kolkata, India
Children wander across the active train tracks in Kolkata, where a train passes by every 20 minutes
Located in Kolkata, India, the slum is home to around 1,000 residents and their makeshift shelters sit a foot away from tracks where trains roar past every 20 minutes.
Indian photographer
The 26-year-old, also from Kolkata,
'Most of the people living in the slum have come to Kolkata from different districts of West Bengal, or from the adjoining states, to earn a living.
'Due to the lack of permanent homes and the ever increasing cost of living in the city, these people made makeshift homes beside the railway tracks, ignoring all adversities.
'The residents of this slum live like
Residents perform a religious ceremony at night while a train passes them on an adjacent track
A woman brushes her hair as she gets ready for the day while passengers inside a passing train look on
A boy climbs over the train tracks amid a downpour. Despite its growing economy, slum areas such as these are continuing to expand
Despite its massive and fast-growing economy, the wealth gap in India continues to grow, with slum areas such as these continuing to expand.
Most people living in the slum live in makeshift bamboo houses, which are usually only big enough to fit two people.
She
'I felt a real mixture of feelings while making this series. Sometimes it's painful to see the odds these people have to face every day. But, on the other hand, their unity is something that each and every human being should learn.
A woman brushes her hair and two men chat as they walk past residents' possessions that are stacked just feet away from the tracks
A woman takes hurriedly makes her way home amid a deluge or rain as a man sits under cover inside his bamboo shelter
A woman stokes a fire underneath a pot inside a makeshift clay fire pit beside the active train tracks
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by Sonya Griffin 567