A shared vision for a better neighborhood...
Near Chandrabhaga beach in Konark, a small town in eastern part of Odisha is a slum called ‘Nolia Sahi’. About 1100 fishermen families have resided in the slum for more than 40 years. These people live in temporary structures without basic facilities and their major source of livelihood is catching and selling fish.
It is one of the first slums in which the implementation of the Odisha Land Rights to Slum Dwellers Act, 2017 has taken place. This was possible because of community participation throughout the entire process of implementation. The Slum Dwellers Association (SDA) was formed which had participation from each household and ensured community support in each step. The community was involved right from the process of household level survey, the identification of boundaries, to the preparation of an eligible list of beneficiaries to give land titles.
After the disbursement of land titles, the community worked closely with the technical experts like architects from the Norman Foster Foundation and Tata Trusts , in order to prepare a vision map for their slum. The objective was to visualize how the slum dwellers wanted to see their slum in the future.
The discussions were held with different groups in the community including women, children and youth. Each suggested their own vision of the slum like better access to roads, aligned houses, shorter routes to reach the beach etc.“I am very happy that they had discussions with us women also as we also have certain demands but there was nobody to listen”, says C. H. Saroni
Based on the discussions and suggestions of the entire community, the technical experts from the Norman Foster Foundation and Tata Trusts integrated the visions of each of the groups and came up with an improved design for the slum, which included the toilets in each household, roads, market place for selling fishes and other things, social infrastructures like Anganwadi Centres for the children up to 3 years of age and school for the children.
The integrated design was discussed and finalized by the community with support from the technical experts. The houses which need to shift a bit for broadening of the road etc was discussed and the community readily agreed to it. The slum dwellers were elated with the prospect of the development of the slum and were very happy to see the models of their slum. “I could not believe my eyes when I saw the model of our slum, I am very happy and hope that the work starts soon and we can see the development in our slum which has evaded us for years,” says Piki Tatuli
“I have grown old but I am very happy that my children will have better future with better facilities”, says Chodipalli Kondamma
The whole community came together as one and are happy that the process brought them together with shared interests. Also, since the process is community driven, the pace of work being undertaken is at a much faster pace under the ambit of Odisha Liveable Habitat Mission. The Mission was launched on May 7, 2018 by the Honourable CM Mr. Naveen Patanaik and is implemented across the state for provision of basic services to the slum dwellers in the slum and transformation of slums into liveable habitats.
Tata Trusts has partnered with the state government for the implementation of the Mission across 3000 slums of the state.
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Story contributed by Tata Trusts
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