REPORT OF THE DISCUSSION ON HOUSING ORGANISED BY KRRC IN COLLABORATION WITH UNNATI FOR THE NGOs AND INGOs INVOLVED IN HOUSING FOR THE TSUNAMI AFFECTED PEOPLE IN KANYAKUARI DISTRICT

Date: 11.01.06, Venue: Hotel Vijayatha, Time: 10 a.m.- 4 .15 p.m

Source: KRRC

A one-day discussion on housing for the tsunami affected people was held with NGOs and INGOs involved in housing in Kanyakumari district on 11th Jan 2006 at hotel Vijayatha. Unnathi and KRRC jointly organized the programe. Thirty-six participants from twenty-six organizations participated in the discussions.

List of the participant organizations:

INTERVIDA, RUC, HEALTH FOR ONE MILLION, CADRE INDIA, UNNATI, SALVATION ARMY, KSSS, SWADHINA, ESAF, CRD OF INDIA, IEDS, SOSO, ARCHITECHTURE & DEVELOPMENT, NCRC, SHATHIDAN, UEM, UNDP, OXFAM, GOOD VISION, PHD INDIA, STELLA MARIS, WORLD VISION, KRRC, YMCA, MATHA AMIRTHANNADHAMAYEE, SED


A technical team of three members, Mr. Binnoy Acharya, Mr. Vivek Rawal and Mr. Dinesh from Unnati, Gujarat were present to provide the necessary technical inputs and guidance; Mr. Mano Thankaraj the District Panchayat Chairman, Mr. Prakash, IAS the Additional Collector in charge of relief and rehab activities in Kanyakumari district and Mr. Antony Xavier from NCRC were special invitees to share their experiences.

The discussion started at 10.30 a.m. Fr. Nithya Sahayam from KRRC welcomed the participants and gave a brief introduction about the background and the importance of the discussion after one year of the rehabilitation context. Mr. Vivek Rawal from Unnati introduced the schedule of the day’s discussion. Mr. Binoy Acharaya from Unnati facilitated the discussions.

All the participants introduced themselves and their organizations. Followed by the self-introduction, Mr. Binoy Acharya began the discussion with enlightening thoughts. He shared that rehabilitation was a spiritual journey in which the process was more important than the target. The discussion was not intended to find out the commissions and omissions rather it should help for identifying the strength and the positives of the rehabilitation and further to find out and address the areas of need jointly.

SHARING OF NGOs

Based on the field experiences, the participants shared their opinions and views regarding the various aspects of housing scenario in Kanyakumari district.

Public Space

Question regarding public space in the relocation sites was raised. Habitation was not merely a construction process there were social, economic and political processes involved. People spent more time outside the house than inside the house hence it was questioned why not provide more public space in the rehabilitation sites. The government provided only three cents of land in the panchayat areas and 1.5 cents in the municipality areas as per the government policy. It was suggested that though it was not possible to increase more space in the government programmes, it could be thought of in the other programmes. It was also argued whether land was the real constraint for more public space. The way the lay out was planned was also very important for getting more public space. Though some NGOs shared that they gave more space at the backside of the house and people were also involved in the selection of the layouts, yet, the general feeling was that more public space was needed in the relocation sites.

Issues of Distance:

It was shared that there were much confusion in the beginning regarding people living within which distance from the sea should be relocated. Government initially said that they would not support any construction within 200 feet and latter they allowed NGOs to construct within 200 feet. In the government driven programme the people were not allowed to resettle below 200 feet and in the NGOs programmes they were allowed. Government was not allowing X to stay in one place but allowing Y to stay in the same place. In the high tide areas, the people within fourty meters were being shifted. But a huge population was living within forty- two hundred meters facing the sea. There were no options or programmes for their resettlement.

In some place people were shifted to far places, which might affect their livelihood. Neerodi the people were shifted to 1.5 Km away which was a non-fishing area. While relocating, the distance must be minimal as to safeguard people’s safety as well as livelihood.

Issues of Electricity to the Individual households and management of the public infrastructures and sanitation

One of the most important questions was on the floor regarding how the individual houses would be given electricity supply without getting approval for the housing plan from the panchayat. The questions of managing public infrastructures such as roads, street lights, water tanks and sanitation were also simultaneously raised. The main issue was not only construction but also management of the roads, water, drainage and infrastructures and who managed them.

Corollary to these questions, the immediate needs such as title to land, patta and plan approval for individual houses and surrendering the public infrastructures to the panchayat were to be addressed immediately. Layouts were made as per the direction of the government and there were no garbage waste management plan in the government.
The involvement of Panchayats was found to be very much essential in this regard which was so far not there.

The government did not spend any amount for the infrastructure the NGOs bore the brunt of the infrastructures as well.

Problems of the homeless

The policy adopted by the district for the rehabilitation was ‘one house to one house’. There were joint families living in the same house who were also affected by tsunami. By the policy of ‘one house to one house’ the joint families did not get any entitlement for new housing but became homeless. Even with the good will of the people to accommodate those who did not receive entitlement for housing, the space would be insufficient and it would be congested and suffocated. The difficulty in getting ration cards for the joint families was another barrier in accessing the individual family level entitlements.

Quality of the houses

The quality of the constructions was applauded. Compared to the construction elsewhere, the quality of the housing in Kanyakumari was very much higher.

Participation of the Community

One of the serious allegations in the housing was the poor participation of the community in the entire process. Beneficiaries did not know which his /her house was. Under the oblivious conditions, the people could neither monitor nor support the construction of their own housing. Though some of the organizations shared that they discussed with the people regarding the layouts, plans, size of the house and the construction was done with the approval of the people; yet, there was no role for the people for their active participation.

Repaired houses and dilapidated houses

It was a strategic and successful programme lead by the district administration supporting repairing of as many houses, which reduced number of temporary shelters. But, the group felt that there were no criteria nor any technical assessment made for determining whether a house could be repaired or not. There were also many houses purport to be undamaged but in a dilapidated condition. The safety of those houses was also not assessed. There were no retrofitting efforts nor replacement efforts so far made for those houses.

There was also fear among the people regarding what would happen to the old houses. An in-depth discussion needed with the Government, NGOs and the community.

Concluding Notes

Mr. Binoy Acharya time to time provided summary points to the various issues raised. He shared that the government also needed some cut points while determining its programmes. But finally it was the community and the PRI who were living there for generations in the same locality, who should decide and their interest should be protected. Govt worked to give faster responses. But now, we need to look back our perspectives, formulate new criteria or we will be struck!

Why not housing insurance be taken up as a development programme? And also drinking water, waste disposal etc? If we changed our perspective, our criteria would also change.
Creating a database of the gap was necessary. What would be the criteria to make the list? Initially the criterion was different now it should be different. KRRC should play a major role in this context.

Study report by Mr. Vivek Rawal

Followed by the sharing session, Mr. Vivek Rawal from Unnati presented through power point the report of the study conducted by Unnati in collaboration with KRRC in the temporary shelters and in the permanent shelters in 14 tsunami affected villages in Kanyakumari district. The study report said that 80% houses were being constructed in new locations and 20% in situ. Quoting from the study of UNDP, he said that rebuilding insitu would not be violation of CRZ. More repair works were done in KK District so that temporary shelters were avoided. Though many people were satisfied with the choices of the location of the temporary shelters, the conditions of temporary shelters, the materials used, space and the sanitation facilities were not satisfactory.

Regarding permanent shelter, more people were satisfied with the quality of the housing. Compared to other places, the masonry work was very good.

The selection of the place for the construction was quite good. Many places had good earth though in some cases it was not so.

There was very much gap in the participation of the people. People did not know which their house was. Though people were discussed regarding the plan of the house, they could not easily understand the blue print but only when the construction took place, then only they realized the real plan. The study suggested that better tools needed to be employed while describing the designs to the people.

The study also focused that the people were kept ignorant of their house until it was handed over to them. There was also no choice for neighborhood selection. They would have contributed their mind and labor if they had known which their house was. Their participation needed to be strengthened.

But, there were no guidelines for retrofitting and there were gaps in understanding the technical guidelines. As per the technical guidelines given by the Tamil Nadu government, there should have been vertical bar reinforcement in every T corners. But it was misunderstood as only in the four corners of the house. There was gap also in understanding what a grade beam was. In the context of tsunami, a ground level concrete reinforcement was needed to stop the scouring of tsunami.

AFTERNOON DISCUSSIONS

Presentation by Mr. Antony Xavier, NCRC

Through power point presentation, Mr. Antony Xavier described the status, progresses and the processes of rehabilitation in Nagapattinam. He shared that 24% of the construction was complete and the number of total houses were increased from around 20000 to 27000. Thirty percentages of houses were being constructed in situ, 1% in Government land, 49% in private land and 29%in temple land. Till date, 438 houses had been completed.

There was also the problem in identifying the land for the housing, due to which the relocation got delayed.

There were various models of housing planned and there was also tripartite participation of the community, NGOs and the government.

Issues and concerns regarding distance, elevation, encroachment,, legal matters, equity and livelihood were also described. Identifying that ancient villages were in elevated areas and every Panchayat had cyclone shelters, he said that with the onslaught of the development, people forgot the traditional wisdom.

Trainings for architects and engineers were done. Regarding the quality, the collector was monitoring it.

Some of the interesting interventions were such as total stations survey, ensuring access to shorefront, community driven construction, training on safety factors, community quality monitoring, labor net, business development meet and transit shelters being planned.


Sharing from Gujarat Experiences

Mr. Mano Thankaraj, Fr. Nithya Sahayam and Mr. Xavier from Stella Maris shared their experiences from their exposure visit to Gujarat. All of them identified that wherever there was more participation of the people in the construction process, there were innovations, more space for the people and more community spirit. Wherever there were no or less participation of the people, those relocation sites were either not occupied or less occupied. The owner driven approach was very much successful in the Gujarat experience.

It was also shared that retrofitting was successfully undertaken in Gujarat. The role of networking of NGOs for addressing the gaps and for pioneering technical innovations was lessons to be learnt from there.

While comparing the Gujarat interventions to Kanyakumari district, it was identified that though the quality of the construction was quite high, yet there were gaps in addressing the issues of retrofitting and eliciting the participation of the community and the Panchayats.

Sharing by Mr. Prakash IAS, Additional Collector

He shared that there was a panel of expert committee at the district level who took care of the housing. Compared to any other place, the quality of the construction was very high and so far no complaints had been received from any houses handed over to the people. The infrastructures were also being constructed by the NGOs. Though the district could have got Rs. 20 crore from the Asian Development Bank for infrastructures, the time and the process in getting the amount would have delayed the entire process.

Within four months of time, around 4000 houses were repaired which reduced the number of temporary shelters and the need for constructing that many new houses. Nine hundred houses were also being constructed in the high tide affected areas. The district was envisioning completing all houses by the month of March and handing over them to the beneficiaries. He ended his sharing adjuring to NGOs also to contribute for the electricity for the individual houses.

Concluding Notes of the Afternoon sessions

One of the major issues was the participation of the people. It was a myth to think that people’s participation takes time and we should think how to make them participate in the restoration. The second issue was regarding creating a culture of safety and a secure habitat. It was also the time to think about the coastal area development in which the issues of livelihood versus security had to be addressed. The sea front development and site development have to be taken up. Most importantly, there is need for technical assessment of the repair works done, identifying the gaps in the replacement of the dilapidated ones and taking up the retrofitting needs. Involving the PRI in the entire process was essential and coordination mechanisms needed to be strengthened. Study was also necessary to find out the left outs.

Each house estimate should be developed for retrofitting or replacement. Technical engineers should be trained in these retrofitting and safety aspects. A meeting with PRI, NGOs and the Government was also found necessary. A meeting at Chennai for all the resource centers was also needed to develop perspective plans.

It was suggested by the participants that an exposure visit to Nagapattinam could be also arranged for some NGOs involved in housing.

Community preparedness materials were also distributed to the participant organizations.

Vote of Thanks:

Mr. Xavier from Stella Maris thanked the participants, Unnati people and the Additional Collector. The discussion ended at 4.15 p.m.