This analysis is based on two assumptions.

l Cancer is linked to environmental pollution.

l The poorest of the poor live in the most polluted environmental conditions.

It is an effort to explore a third aspect with the strength of the first two: is cancer becoming an increasing problem among India's urban poor? Because if it is not, then either of the first two are incorrect. But why bother at all about this almost academic exercise? Firstly, it is not an academic exercise but a matter of public health concern. Because if this is true, as it should be given the two assumptions, then we are sitting on a virtual time bomb. As India tries to industrialise, cancer will become more of a problem. This is already the case in developed countries such as Japan, where cancer is the biggest killer (see