Rina Chandran -
When Ramilaben Arvind studied the plan to move out of her one-room home in a congested slum into a modern apartment for no extra cost in India’s Ahmedabad city, she immediately agreed.
But first she had to get 67 other families to say ‘yes’.
Arvind, head of the slum’s community organisation, had to convince residents to let their homes be demolished, to move elsewhere for two years, and trust that city officials and the developer would deliver flats at the same location at no cost.
“It was difficult. Not everyone trusted the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation or the builder. Or me,” she said, standing in the apartment she moved into two months ago.
Arvind’s home is among the more than 3,500 slum homes in Ahmedabad that have been redeveloped as part of a state programme to upgrade cities.
A further 4,000 slum homes are being redeveloped through a partnership of the city, builders and the community.
While previous programmes to upgrade slums generally entailed relocating unwilling residents to often badly built housing on the outskirts of the city, the 2010 policy encouraged in-situ redevelopment or rehousing residents in the same spot.
Ahmedabad has succeeded by involving slum residents and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and by increasing the area that developers can build, allowing taller, denser buildings, part of which can be sold at market rates to recover costs.
“Ahmedabad city has a long history of working with NGOs on slum projects, so it is only natural that they are involving them in this,” said Chirayu Bhatt at the Center for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT).
“Now, even developers are engaging with NGOs, and that is instrumental in moving these projects forward.”
Involving non-profit organisations has worked for Ahmedabad, the economic hub of western Gujarat state.
“We were involved right from the start, coordinating with city officials and developers, and making sure residents had a say,” said Bharati Bhonsale, a programme manager at Mahila Housing Trust (MHT), a non-profit focused on women.
“Because residents already knew us and trusted us, the process was far quicker and easier,” she said.
MHT sees women residents as essential to enabling upgrades and redevelopment. It trains a woman like Arvind in each slum to be a community leader, educating her on issues and rights, on dealing with city officials and completing paperwork.
“Women are the most affected by the housing situation, by the lack of facilities, so they are more invested in any process that can lead to better housing,” said Bhonsale.
The new apartments that Arvind and her neighbours moved into are 300 sq ft each, comprising two rooms, a toilet and a kitchenette.
All tenants received ownership titles that have the name of the woman householder as well as the man. They are free to transfer or sell their flats after 20 years.
Arvind leads the residents’ association in the building, named Devipujak Nagar Co-operative Housing Society, overseeing maintenance and other issues.
This model does not work everywhere: the policy is only for slums on public land, and is not feasible for small plots. Besides, residents need proof of occupancy for 10 years.
Progress has also been slow, covering about a tenth of the city’s nearly 700 slums so far.
“Over the long run, what we need is more low-cost housing so people are not compelled to live in slums in the first place,”
Bhatt at CEPT.
For Arvind though, the wait was worth the while.
“It feels good to live in a proper home at last. Now we have everything we need,” she said. — Thomson Reuters Foundation
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
