The process of rehabilitation in Sabarmati Riverfront Development project, Ahmedabad.

Much surrounds the process of Urbanization, whereby one must not merely perceive it as a modern phenomenon, but a rapid transformation of human social and political roots on a global scale. Cities are known to be places where money, services and wealth are centralized. Many rural inhabitants come to the city for reasons of seeking fortunes and social mobility. The migrants, often seen as the working class, strive to become a part of the urban milieu. They establish a relationship with their context and owing to an engagement with the physical and social forces within it that they begin to settle down. They find work, build a shelter and with their family start a living. However, uncertainties circling them make them the target population that bears the brunt of development. Development although beneficial tends to exclude the strata it is not aimed at. It has often resulted in fostering social and economic inequalities serving the interests of the marrow elite, destroying the environment, displacing and impoverishing people dependent on land. One such case is that of 14,000 households evicted from the bank of river Sabarmati in Ahmedabad, owing to a large-scale development on the riverfront. Navdeep Mathur in his paper has described the process that surrounds rehabilitation from a position of a participant and observer in the proceedings of the Sabarmati Riverfront development project. He talks about violent demolition of homes, evictions from habitations that provided access to livelihoods, schooling, social and physical security and public health services. The proposal estimated that 4,400 families living the riverbank would be considered project affected and offered consolidated housing on the riverbank itself at three locations. The incorrect estimation proved to be the first blow in the entire process of resettling the affected. The information about specific plans for rehabilitation was not formally disclosed to the families, and fearing mass eviction the settlers formed a coalition called the Sabarmati Nagrik Adhikar Manch (SNAM), facilitated by non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The coalition lodged a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the Gujarat High Court to ensure that the local authority provided them a rehabilitation plan and a transparent process of identification and coverage of families living on the riverbank, prior to the commencement of project construction. While this PIL was filed, the local authority created the possibility of interim rehabilitation in order to facilitate the riverfront companys plans to start the project. Meanwhile, the court ordered the company to provide the count of project-affected families more closely. This began a movement by community leaders for ensuring cohesion in their clusters, so that individual households did not break moral strength of the movement. However, in the years 2004-05, 3,000 to 4,000 families were evicted from the riverfront as well as other urban infrastructure projects all over the city. Under interim rehabilitation scheme, the AMC shifted these families to a marshland at the citys edge in PIplaj, Pirana Road, which lay under electricity transmission towers and adjacent to a municipal solid waste dump site. The families were provided open plots of 10 by 15 feet, with little access to drinking water and minimal sanitation facilities. Promises of education, employment, health and sanitation facilities were never delivered. Apart from loss of livelihood, families experienced serious health issues and a majority of children dropped out of school. When the SNAM redressed a complaint regarding the services on the new site, the court was more responsive to the government view than the view of the residents groups.

In the years following the project, academic critiques with their writings began to emerge and lead the movement along with student groups. They questioned the projects skewed perspective on the riverbank settlements, which ignored the everyday negotiations of the residents, workers directing them to hollow promises of a disconnected rehabilitation plan. In due course of time, collaborations led to a number of workshops, seminars, and public hearings to discuss routes towards resolution could be sought. Another group called Our Inclusive Ahmedabad consisting of NGOs, social service organizations, community-based organizations, community members joined the academicians. A 12-member jury was instituted, and called for the deposition of all affected groups-street vendors, residents of the riverbank settlements, traders from Gujri baazar and other notified members. The jury also called for a group of government officials, Urban planners, NGOs who were directly involved in service delivery. With immense public and media exposure, the High court took note of the issues raised in the public hearing and gave a favourable judgment in the PIL launched by the slum-dwellers. A process of housing allotment began shortly thereafter, with the community leaders engaged in monitoring the allotment process and verifying the counting and identification process of eligible households for rehabilitation. The allotment brought into light new layers of illegalities within the informal settlements. Some of these families were unable to produce valid proofs of their long stay at a specific site and were considered ineligible for resettlement. The community leaders took it on themselves to verify their testimonies leading to fraudulent allotment of houses. Some of the actual beneficiaries moved to the streets while the ones who received houses instead were under patronage of the so called leaders. Layers and layers of uncertainties surrounded the allotment process determined by the arbitrary cut-off date. The conundrum led to formalization of a process of paperwork regarding allotment of rehabilitation housing under the BSUP scheme. Some 13 different sites had been identified where construction of four-storey flats of 25-28 square meters each were to be constructed to house each evicted family irrespective of family size, based on eligibility being validated through possession of identity papers, address proofs, birth certificates, etc. However, none of these hoses were habitable, a monitoring committee was appointed to track the progress of housing allotments on each site. There was no process to allot houses in a way that could accommodate different family sizes, or avail appropriate housing to people with special needs. Moreover, while some of these houses were nearing completion, a massive demolition took place in May 2011. Over 200 families, including women and small children were forced to live in the sun next to their demolished houses. The residents approached the court with a plea for mercy, even after the chief justice issued orders to cease any evictions and demolitions without completing and allotting rehabilitation housing, hundreds of homes were bulldozed for a next couple of days. After the grueling process of shifting into new homes, today most of the rehabilitation sites have been settled for over 3 years. The evictees amidst all the chaos are striving to find employment, settle their families and start off a living once again. A couple of sites that were carefully located within the city limits have been able to rehabilitate faster than those on the periphery, however, the question to the solution against the chaotic process undertaken to resettle the homeless still remains unanswered. Bibliography: Mathur, Navdeep; On the Sabamati Riverfron- Urban planning as totalitarian

governance in Ahmedabad; EPW, Dec 2012, vol xlviI nos 47 & 48.