| Round
Table Discussion on “Night Shelters-A Dire
Need” by Mr. Anshu Prakash (IAS), Additional
Commissioner, MCD; Mr. Miloon Kothari, Former UN
Special Rapporteur on adequate Housing, UN Human Rights Council
and Ms. Asha Menon, Member Secretary, Delhi Legal
Services Authority. Chaired by Ms. Kavita Sharma,
Director, India International Centre and Former Principal, Hindu
College in India International Centre, Max Mueller Marg, New Delhi–
110 003
23rd April 2010
HIGHLIGHTS
- There are almost 1.5 lakh homeless people in the city of Delhi.
The condition of the people came to the foreground because of
their evictions from the "rain baseras" caused by changes
in the landscape of the city on account of the ongoing preparations
for the Commonwealth Games. There is a need for policy on the
condition of these poorer sections of the society, not only because
their activities and presence affect our real life, but also because
of their sheer numbers.
- These poorer citizens of our society are in such a pathetic
condition because of the increasing rich-poor divide. The political
leadership having promised food, shelter, health and education
for all, has endeavoured to provide night shelter to the poor
but these have been inadequate, both in quality as well as quantity.
- The issue of night shelters concerns citizens and is about
homelessness. Homelessness is present throughout the world in
variant degrees, from 'Soup Kitchens' in Chicago where people
sleep on the streets to of people sleeping on pavements in Delhi.
- Growth with this kind of inequity is simply not sustainable.
The 'shining' India hides many un-shining things in this country.
We seem to inhabit different worlds which will implode on us,
if not they have not already begun to.
- There is also a glaring lack of social security networks. The
West has tried to evolve something which works or does not work,
in varying degrees and there are many points of view on this aspect,
from the size of people who receive it or those who give it. But
the fact is that there are no social security networks even for
the so-called 'resourceful', the rich and healthy, or the urbanised.
For the poor of course, they are totally absent. We have to look
into the concept of night shelters and the short-term and long-term
issues involved and solutions.
- The issue of night shelters is something far beyond the Commonwealth
Games. The Government of Delhi and MCD are sensitised and much
concerned and responsive to the need for night shelters and the
entire policy of night shelters in urban areas. According to most
estimates, people who stay in slums, in jhuggi-jhopdi clusters
and are relocated in resettlement colonies perhaps number about
40 lakhs.
- Shelters are insufficient in numbers and those available are
also poorly managed. They lack amenities like toilets, mattresses,
blankets in winter, recreational facilities, health facilities,
security; a whole gamut of facilities which can be normally thought
of by any sensible person. The location of these shelters is also
a problem.
- We would like to have a policy, which on ground, takes care
of all these ills, remedying and rectifying the problems. Funds
are not a constraint.
- As far as the future roadmap is concerned, all stakeholders
from the government and the non-government sectors must have a
committed interface.
- The recommendation of separate identity cards for night shelter
dwellers is not tenable, as it would give a wrong notion of some
kind of entitlement. Special needs shelters for women and children
are necessary, though such shelter for the mentally challenged,
or for people with peculiar kind of illness is a little beyond
the scope of night shelters. Of course, the government cannot
abdicate its possibility of providing for such sections of the
society.
- Historically, the root of the problem goes back to around 1995
when a series of judgements in the Honourable High Courts and
the Supreme Court referred to slum-dwellers as pickpockets and
encroachers, essentially created a sub-class of citizens who did
not have any rights just because they did not have a place of
their own to stay. Fortunately, this is beginning to change.
- Estimatedly, since 2004, close to 400,000 people have been
evicted from their homes. In Delhi, most of them have not been
resettled and that has probably contributed to the growth of homelessness
in the city. There is lack of essential data and we are also burdened
with a woefully inadequate shelter system.
- It is important not to look at homeless people or people in
night shelters as mere numbers, but at the kind of impact that
they generate. We must think of it from the lens of human rights.
It is particularly important that we have a right to adequate
housing, health, food and approach.
- Many different factors have come together to create a situation
where all of us can gather and try to collectively think of solutions,
rather than disagreeing on the very basic fundamental issues.
The Commonwealth Games are around the corner, and looking at the
trends, it is very clear that more slums are going to be cleared,
with more repression against beggars - this has already been announced
- with mobile squads and so on and this will contribute to homelessness
as well.
- We still are struggling with the perception of the middle and
upper class residents in Delhi who do not want homeless people
anywhere around them, do not want the homeless to have a shelter
in their neighbourhood, and do not want to see beggars. This is
a very serious problem.
- We have a consistent pattern of a national economic policy
that is very much geared towards privatisation, speculation and
promotion of various markets, which will make cities more and
more expensive. It will not even be possible to find buildings
where shelters can be put up, as the cost would simply be astronomical.
- Facilities available to even prisoners are denied to the free
citizens who cannot avail of even basic amenities because of their
homelessness. People who come to cities for medical treatment
are not beggars or criminals, but people who probably need to
be with their kith and kin in the hospitals. There is no facility
available where they could spend the night. They do not have money
to pay for private wards, and the shelters meant for them are
absolutely shabby.
- The government has a policy but it has no inkling of the need
and therefore, they are not provided. The judiciary has stepped
in to guide the administration. Unfortunately, people who are
directly in conflict with law have been given a certain minimum
facility than those who are free citizens.
- The question of sensitivity does not seem to exist in many
of the things that the government bodies do, including slum clearance.
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