[in-enaction] Mid-winter evictions

On 14 December 2002, a fortnight after the High Court struck down Delhi's slum policy and allowed eviction without resettlement of slums getting in the way of planned development, Express Newsline reported the first of the mid-winter evictions. I had circulated a panicky piece of plannerly prose to plead that what was reported had nothing to do with planned development. I have now come across another news report that confirms this. I don't know what to think or say except that someone owes a huge apology and more to those callously evicted. The news report from last week, as well as the prose of 14.12.02 is here.

Gita Dewan Verma / Planner / 05.02.03

 

Neighbourhood Flash

Vol-V, No.9 January 19-26, 2003

Alaknanda

RESIDENTS FAVOUR COMMUNITY CENTRE IN PLACE OF SLUM AREA

By Priyanka Gupta

Subhash Chopra, DPCC president and MLA of Alaknanda constituency along with Municipal Councilor of the area Virendra Kasana, DDA Vice-Chairman Subhash Sharma, MCD Deputy Commissioner Subhash Sharma, Chief Engineers of DDA, DDA Planning Commissioner Vijay Risbud, and Landscaping Commissioner Savita Bhandari arranged a meeting with the residents of the area in the lawns of Mandakini Enclave. The agenda was to get the residents' view on what they want on the five acres of land that has recently been vacated by the slum dwellers.

The representatives of all the apartments complexes in Alaknanda, including Shivalik, Godavari, Ganga, Kaveri, Narmada, Mandakini, Tara, Gangotri, Nilgiri, Yamuna and NRI Complex presented their views. More than 100 residents attended the meeting. The view was generally in favour of a Community Centre / Baraat Ghar, recreational centre for senior citizens, Health Club or a sports complex. As Mandakini Enclave was worst affected area by the jhuggi dwellers, LD Mittal, president Mandakini Enclave said: "We appreciate the efforts of our elected representatives in getting the area cleared. Along with all the other Alaknanda residents, we want this place for activities that are lacking in our area. We do not have any place where we can perform marriage functions or a recreation centre for Senior Citizens, or even a sports complex, health club or swimming pool."

The residents also added that they do not want any commercial activity in the area. Considering this, Subhash Chopra assured the residents that construction of anything would be done in accordance with their wishes. He said, "We got the jhuggis relocated only with the support of the residents and now it should be utilised by the residents of the area. We will go through the original plan and see what best we can do".

 

 

DDA'S MID-WINTER SLUM DEMOLITIONS: NOTHING TO DO WITH 'PLANNED DEVELOPMENT'

Gita Dewan Verma / Planner / 14.12.02

DDA has just begun slum demolition 'on priority basis', as per a news item cheerily titled, perhaps to cheer DDA on in this mid-winter enthusiasm, 'Civic bodies shift bulldozer gears'. DDA officials, the report says, 'point out that the drive was started because DDA is clearing lands meant for commercial use'. For the slum where it began, an official is quoted saying it occupied land meant for 'a big commercial project', 'specifics' of which are 'yet to be worked out', but 'the land was very costly and needed to be developed'. That, presumably, is part-justification for mid-winter demolition. The rest, the report says, is that this 'will come as a relief to residents' of adjoining DDA flats. It does not quote any resident on this and I'd like to believe that, howsoever much the nuisance from the slum, flat residents would not place it above the distress mid-winter evictions can cause slum dwellers, including those that work for them. But this is not about distress of slum dwellers or what others find or do not find in their hearts about this distress. This is about the dubious basis of DDA's actions, which are not justifiable in the name of 'planned development'.

DDA is a public authority created and bound by an Act of Parliament that enjoins upon it the sole responsibility of securing Delhi's development according to Plan. By way of Plan the Act contemplates not DDA's schemes, which it prepares and approves rather independently, but Delhi's Master Plan, which is approved by Parliament. The Master Plan is the statutory framework for planned development for the benefit of all in the city and, contrary to popular perception, has adequate provisions for the poor, including for low-income housing. The Plan can be, indeed usually is, viewed as a plannerly artifact that DDA knows best. Equally it can be, indeed should be, viewed as a document of citizens' entitlements in benefits of planned development that DDA is duty-bound to implement and all are obliged to respect.

Master Plan entitlements of the poor are something DDA has conveniently neglected even as these are what it is bound to accord priority to - not out of humane-ness or even in the spirit of the welfare state, but arguably by its law. DDA's Act does not contemplate land ownership by DDA, only development according to Plan. It was for this that DDA was vested with public land cheaply acquired under a policy of socialisation of land. An explicit purpose of this policy is low-income housing and for furtherance of this purpose the Plan stipulates, for instance, that in a residential development for one lakh people, a fourth must be by way of cheap plots for the poor, including 'city service personnel'. In the area where DDA has begun its mid-winter drive, it has not implemented this mandatory provision. As such, the slum-dwellers are better described as DDA's implementation backlog on its statutory responsibility of development according to Plan than as encroachers on DDA land, which is 'its' only for the said responsibility. Seen thus, DDA's slum demolitions appear to be classic cases of the culprit punishing the victim.

The purpose - 'big commercial project' - to be served by this demolition also has no basis in the Plan. Commercial sites in housing areas are meant for local commercial facilities, not 'big commercial projects'. This is to protect residential amenity, as city-level commerce in housing areas will create problems of traffic, parking, noise and pollution and infrastructure stress. It will also employ city service personnel, which will very likely lead to slum formation in the absence of planned housing for them. DDA is custodian of Delhi's Master Plan and of public land needed for it. It cannot become a grass-eating fence, free to monetise the real-estate worth of every piece of 'costly' land.

DDA's 'priority' is also suspect - not only for the callousness of mid-winter evictions to clear land for dubious projects whose specifics have yet to be worked out, but because the Plan makes it incumbent upon DDA to base its implementation priorities on systematic monitoring of Plan targets. It is extremely unlikely that any survey or monitoring would find greater 'need' for up-market development in departure from the Plan than implementation of Plan entitlements of the poor, so obviously the biggest backlog in the planned development of Delhi, fast turning it into a slum.

'Delhi's planned development' is not a mere phrase open to willful interpretation, but a construct duly defined by the statutory Master Plan, its enabling Act and facilitating land policy. Mid-winter demolitions are acts of state that really have no place in civilised society and whatever the reasons for DDA's enthusiasm about them, these have nothing to do with Delhi's planned development so defined.

-----------

'Civic bodies shift bulldozer gears' <http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=38102>

-----------

It is noteworthy that the matters of misuse by DDA of land meant for low-income housing for up-market housing and of land meant for local commercial facilities in residential areas for up-market city commerce are both sub-judice in the High Court and DDA has not filed reply. And in this same winter week objections have been raised about DDA's 'partnerships' with 'reputed construction firms' to misuse public land for up-market development in excess of norms and with 'NGOs of repute' to misuse public land for sub-standard slum housing in violation of the Plan.

---

Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8  and get 2 months FREE*