The Times of India 14.03.2011
Housing project to shift urban poor to the suburbs should be more spacious: PIL
CHENNAI: A Public Interest Litigation has been filed in the Madras High Court
pleading that the Perumbakkam resettlement and rehabilitation (R&R)
project be remodeled to have not more than 5000 houses.
The
upcoming R&R project in Perumbakkam, located a few kilometers from
the fast developing OMR IT corridor, aims to build around 27,000 houses
(project I and II) for below poverty line families.
Concerned
about the mushrooming resettlement and rehabilitation (R&R) projects
that shift the urban poor to localities far away from the city, A
Narayanan, editor of Tamil magazine Paadam’, has filed the PIL.
Each block in the Perumbakkam project would consist of eight floors
with 24 flats of about 170 square feet of living space and two lifts
with a generator and electrical junction room.
The petition
states that the stairs and space separating the two houses is too narrow
by normal standards for a likely population of 900 people per block’.
There is no provision for a terrace in the blocks, the petition adds.
Pointing out that the project is one among a string of similar R&R
projects that have taken place in the city over the last 10 years,
Narayanan stated that these were carried out by the Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board (TNSCB) with the help of agencies like the Chennai Corporation with funds from the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM).
These tenements have come up both within the city, such as All India
Radio Nagar project, as well as outside the city, such as Kannagi Nagar
and Semmencheri, that come under the Kanchipuram district collectorate.
The petitioner added that at a meeting of officers convened by
the Chief Secretary on March 1, 2010 with reference to the projects at
Kannagi Nagar and Semmencheri, it was clearly made out’ that TNSCB does
not have the manpower and expertise to maintain the infrastructure and
provide service delivery in such tenements.
Though the people
resettled are the most disadvantaged sections of society who have been
deprived of their livelihood and dispossessed of their homes, there are
no medical facilities like a primary health centre or a hospital, the
petition says.