The central government’s project to fully develop every city in the country where the poor must get space for themselves, is failing to serve its purpose.
The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), the central government’s project to fully develop every city in the country where the poor must also get space for themselves, is unfortunately failing to serve its purpose.
At a three-day workshop on ‘Shelter, security and social protection for the urban poor and migrants in Asia’ organised by the Cept University at the Gandhi Labour Institute on Wednesday, experts said that the JNNURM project was doing well on the macro level. However, on the micro level, issues of the poor were completely ignored.
Agreeing with this fact, director of the Institute for Human Development, New
Delhi, Alakh Sharma said, “Around 40 per cent of capital assigned to the JNNURM project was to be directed towards the development of the poor. Unfortunately, states across India, including Gujarat, have not used this fund for the same purpose.” The amount sanctioned was instead used for development purposes, for which, a substantial amount was already sanctioned, he said.
On the issue of rehabilitation of the poor, experts said that the new residences given to them were far from their present locations and created problems of employment, schooling, and most importantly, social security.
Commenting on the same, Renu Khosla, director of the Centre for Urban and Regional Excellence, said “Projects like JNNURM are a progressive step not only for the development of the city, but also for the state. However, what lacks is micro-level development for providing a better standard of living for the poor.”
When these people are rehabilitated at peripheral areas of the city, they are provided with houses, but not with related infrastructure like schools and hospitals, among others, Khosla said.
Citing examples of slum dwellers in Mumbai and Delhi who were rehabilitated, Khosla said poor families here were shifted to a distant place where there were no schools. The only alternative their children had was to either travel a distance to study or discontinue schooling for a year or two till schools come up in the area.
According a survey, nearly 50 per cent of these poor children drop out of schools and become engaged in work to support their families. Founder-member of Self Employed Women’s Association (Sewa), Ela Bhatt said, “Roti, kapda aur makaan is the favourite slogan among the masses in India. But, we are yet to graduate from roti to makan.”
One can manage to live on 500 sq yd or 200 sq yd land in the city, but it is impossible for a family to live on 20 sq yard land, Bhatt added.
The first day of the workshop concluded with experts expressing the need for the government to aggressively promote the public-private partnership (PPP) model
to fulfil the requirement of cost-effective houses.
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