HOUSING FOR THE WORKING POOR AND HOMELESS PEOPLE IN DHAKA CITY: PROBLEMS, CAUSES AND E-GOVERNANCE SOLUTION

Definition of Homeless

According to United States Department of Housing and Urban Development:

Homelessness describes the condition of people without a regular dwelling. People who are homeless are most often unable to acquire and maintain regular, safe, secure, and adequate housing, or lack fixed, regular, and adequate night-time residence (Homelessness, 2014)

 “Vagrant” means a person found asking for alms in any public place, or wandering about or remaining in any public place in such condition or manner as makes it likely that such person exists by asking for alms but does not include a person collecting money or asking for food or gifts for a prescribed purpose (THE VAGRANCY ACT,1943)

‘ভবঘুরে’ অর্থ এমন কোন ব্যক্তি যাহার বসবাসের বা রাত্রি যাপন করিবার মত সুনির্দিষ্ট কোন স্থান বা জায়গা নাই অথবা যিনি কোন উদ্দেশ্য ব্যতীত অযথা রাস্তায় ঘোরাফিরা করিয়া জনসাধারণকে বিরক্ত করেন অথবা যিনি নিজে বা কাহারো প্ররোচনায় ভিক্ষাবৃত্তিতে লিপ্ত হন; তবে কোন ব্যক্তি দাতব্য, ধর্মীয় বা জনহিতকর, কোন কাজের উদ্দেশ্যে অর্থ, খাদ্য বা অন্য কোন প্রকার দান সংগ্রহ করিলে এবং উক্ত উদ্দেশ্যে বা কাজে তাহা ব্যবহার করিলে তিনি ইহার অন্তর্ভুক্ত হইবেন না। (ভবঘুরে ও নিরাশ্রয় ব্যক্তি (পুনর্বাসন) আইন,২০১১)

Identifying the homeless of Dhaka

There is no actual figure which suggest the number of homeless people in Dhaka city. According to a survey conducted by Center for Urban Strategies in 2007 about 7%-8% of total Dhaka population are floating people who reside beside roads, rail lines and parks. (Mahmud, 2013)

§  Migrated People

Ø  Migration due to centralized economy

Bangladesh has experienced one of the highest urban population growth rates (around 7% per year) over the past three decades. Dhaka, the capital city, attracts approximately 320,000 migrants from rural areas every year. (Tracey Pérez Koehlmoos, Md. Jasim Uddin, Ali Ashraf, and Mashida Rashid, 2009).

Most of these people become professional beggar, Kuli (type of unskilled labor), cleaner, sex worker etc.

Ø  People who become homeless due to different natural disasters (Flood, Cyclone, River bank erosion etc.) 

According to Asian Disaster Reduction Center (ADRC) 36,556,677 people become homeless in Bangladesh in the time period of 1901 – 2000. In 1998 flood alone left 30 million people homeless (Bureau, 2010) Due to centralized economy and urbanization myths a big portion these people migrate to Dhaka which surplus the homeless people of Dhaka.

§  Untreated mental patient

According to WHO, Bangladesh office, 16.1% of the adult population of Bangladesh are suffering from some sort of mental disorders and require immediate care. Nationwide survey on mental health in Bangladesh in 2003-2005 among people aged 18 years and above revealed that 16.05% of adult population are suffering from mental disorders. The only recognizable facility to treat mental patient is Pabna Mental Hospital. Country’s mental health system condition can be guessed by comment of Golam Rabbani, chief researcher, National Institute of Mental Health “If you look at the total amount of expenditure for the mental health system, you understand that successive governments showed their negligence towards mental health,” Moreover Lunacy Act of 1912 which allow discrimination against mentally ill, remains in effect in Bangladesh.  A big portion of mentally ill people degenerated to homeless due to lack proper treatment and social detachment.

§  Family detached Childs

A 2005 study suggest number of street children in Dhaka city is 249,200.  It is estimated that by the year 2014 the number of children in a street situation would exceed 930,000. ((BIDS), 2005) . A handful number of these children are family detached who involved in begging, theft, child labors, sex slaving etc.

§  Socially detached groups (transgender, Bede etc.)

The social stigma about transgender and Bede people detach them from country’s main culture. Moreover, centralization put a big portion of them in street of Dhaka who normally involved in prostitution and begging. 

Complexity of homeless people in Dhaka

•          Mental and physical challenges

Very limited access to education and health care, Insecurity, no hygiene, exposed to weather, address less, identity crisis etc.

•           Drug Addiction

67 % of male and less than 1% female homeless of Dhaka city are somewhat drug addicted [3]

Homeless People’s Reasoning

The table below shows result of a survey conducted by ICCDR’B in 13 areas of Dhaka city, in June 2007 to June 2008, on people of diverse age group, background

  

Bangladesh Gov. existing policy about homeless

o   Laws: There are two laws that are directly related to homelessness are currently effective.  The Vagrancy ACT 1943 and ভবঘুরে ও নিরাশ্রয় ব্যক্তি (পুনর্বাসন) আইন,২০১১.  Both law shares a common mechanism to dealing with  homelessness problem which involves

-          Identification of homeless through legal system which treat them as same norm of ‘criminal’

-          Priamary assesment through ‘receiving centers’

-          Rehabilatiation on ‘vagarant homes’

-          Punishements of unahuthrozied leaving of vagarant homes

o   Asrayan Project :

A project focusing homeless families affected by natural disasters in coastal areas of Bangladesh

Asrayan (1997-2002 ) – 70 families

Asrayan (phase 2) (2002-2010 ) – 36 families

Asrayan 2 (2010 – 2017 ) – 1930 families ( target 50,000 families )

o   Supervising and co coordinating NGO activities 

Huge amounts of diverse studies and development activities are conducted by different NGO’s focusing homeless problem of Dhaka city. Bangladesh Ministry of Social Welfare plays important in coordinating these works.

WORKING POOR AND SLUM MANAGEMENT OF DHAKA CITY: AN OVERVIEW

Dhaka metropolitan area is home to over 15 million people as of 2013. The population is growing by an estimated 4.2% per year, one of the highest rates among Asian cities.

Approximately 28 percent of Dhaka’s population or 3.36 million people were classified as poor, and 12 percent as extremely poor in 2000 (source : Household Income & Expenditure Survey).

The only housing option available for this huge number of poor people are slums. Based on LGED Slum survey, 2005; There are estimated 1925 slums in the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) area.

They are located all over the city, with Zone 1 having the highest proportion (11 percent slums of area), and Zones 2 and 10 having the lowest with less than 1 percent slums. Much of slum formation is taking place on privately owned land (79 percent), and 18 percent on government owned land.

Like all the slums all over the world, slums of Dhaka city also pose similar risks for the inhabitants and lacks access to basic human rights. Disease, natural disasters, lack of pure water, toxic environment, violence, crime, child malnutrition are all common factors they deal with their everyday life. Slums also pose serious risk for the rest of the city for many reasons such as environmental risk and high degree of chaos.

Perceptions of Poverty

Poverty is perceived by slum dwellers as a shortfall in income, as well as a number of socio-cultural, political and economic factors. The main indicator raised during focus groups was income, but was linked to an individual’s power, position and networks, and occupation. Being a leader or having a salaried job placed individuals in the highest category, while those with ‘lower’ jobs were ranked in the less well-off categories.

Problems Overview

Security of tenure is mentioned as a high priority by the poor, particularly those living in the newer slum area (e.g: Beguntilla). They refer to the constant fear of eviction, extortion by mastaans, and the political connections required to acquire land. Those who are government workers, railway workers, and slum leaders appear to benefit from certain rights and entitlements. The majority of slum dwellers, however, do not have such connections and thus perceive having few if any rights to secure tenure.

Residents in focus groups refer to the many hardships of living in slums. These stresses are enormous. For women, there are additional pressures due to cultural norms which affect where and how they can bath, use toilet, and find drinking water.

Accessing water can be very time consuming, physically demanding, and expensive. Water is typically purchased from private tube well owners and from those with access to legal and illegal connections. Rates can be as high as 15 times the official  unit rate. It is not uncommon for it to take 2 hours to collect water (Feroz, Ahmed,2004). With regard to latrines, there are long lines for the facilities which are dirty, badly maintained and lack privacy. The long waits lead to heated exchanges among residents, the lack of hygiene contributes to illness, and women face security risks if using the latrines at night. Electricity supply and collection of fees are reported to be controlled by local mastaans and can be very expensive for residents.

Many slums are located in low lying areas near the river and are prone to flooding. Approximately 7,600 households in 44 slums live within 50 meters of the river and are at risk of being flooded. Besides, accidents from fire burns everything for so many slum dwellers every year.

Possible Preventive Measures

•          Climate  displacement  issue  should  be  resolved  in  Bangladesh  in  a  right-based approach  incorporating  housing,  land  and  property  rights  as  a  role-model and promote this as an inherent political agenda.
•          Housing  schemes  for  the  affected  people  should  be  launched  by  the  local government of the concerned locations
•          Effective  training  should  be  provided  to  the  homeless  people  for  their rehabilitation and social inclusion for their survive-ability
•          Re-settlement of landless people should be prioritized and it should be facilitated creating self-employment.
•          Rural  poverty  eradication  and  social  security  should  be  addressed  in  sectorial policies.
•         Local level Governance should be ensured to implement social development programs successfully in accountable and transparent manner.
•            Form a multi-disciplinary coalition from different sectors, such as planning, education and employment to address the impact of urban growth, poverty, and the risky health
• experiences of vulnerable groups.

Housing for the Lower Class: Possible Solutions

The problems of housing of people who are homeless and people living in the slums are possible to solve with the active help from both Government and NGO, in other word with public private partnership (PPP). With help of building some cost effective IT infrastructure, we can manage the problems easily and in a more effective way. As corruption is inevitable in our present situation, we want a solution that involves little or no human involvement and where we can have enough transparency for effective mass monitoring.

Following is the detailed approach of the possible solutions we would like to recommend:

Database for the lower class and homeless people

The first step to solve the housing problem is to have a central digital database for the lower class and homeless people. This database will at least contains the following information:

i.          Personal Identity (Name, Age, NID, Address etc)

ii.        Current Job

iii.      Job Expectation

iv.      Skills

v.        Education

vi.      Income

vii.    Housing type

viii.  Allocated Zone

ix.      Allocated House

This database will be connected to the National Database to map and exchange additional information when needed. The primary role of the database would be to identify each individual citizen of the lower class and their allocated benefits like house and job.

Slum Management Portal

After the offline database system is created, the next step would be to create an online portal to make the database available anywhere anytime and to build a mechanism to allow any citizen to view the current status of the management.

The system will allocate the individuals to a zone considering their type of work they do or likely to do, their family member’s occupation and type of worker needed in that zone.

The result of the allocation will be made available through the web site.

Specialized Digital ID Card

Every lower class and homeless individual will be provided  their own special digital ID card. Initially this card will have a QR code as a means to connect it to the central database on different access points.

Scanning the QR code will take the inspector to the web portal and show the profile of the user, allocated house, zone, income and a status flag for rules violation.

Building Vertical Slum

The huge amount of slum dwellers can not be shifted in a single day. But to start the process effectively, we propose to build multi-storey building where each family will be allocated a single room. The building will have basic facility like water supply, toilets, electricity and gas.

The building will also have fire fighting capabilities and other essential minimum safety measures. The rent for the building will be minimum and the income from the housing will be spent for social welfare like for health and education.

Room Allocation

The allocation of the housing will be done automatically by the system. Each room will have a QR code and work as a object in the system. The system will connect each room to a individual and to that person’s family. The allocation will be shown in the public portal and that citizen will be allowed to shift to that facility.

Monitoring

A inspector will monitor the rooms randomly by taking photos of the room’s QR code and it’s inhabitant’s ID card’s QR code. The system will cross check the allocation and if anomaly found, a flag will be raised on the system until the crisis is resolved. This way entire allocation process would be automatic, effective and corruption free.

Co-operative Bank and Medical Facility

The building will have a co-operative banking facility where mobile banking will be made available for these poor people for their daily transaction.  Their ID card will be used to connect their account centrally.

Each building will also have a one room mini hospital for basic treatment and where trained paramedics from the slum will work full time and help the visiting doctors.

Transformation Process

The process of transforming the existing slums to this new type of slums will be under strick guidelines. New policies must be adopted for the private owned slums that will force them to transform.

For that reason, a different housing category will be created by RAJUK for the slums only which will outline building code, facility to fulfill basic human needs like mandatory water supply and other safety facility. Failing to maintain this will make it lawful for eradication of these private slums.

After the housing allocation of a particular zone is completed, the existing slum will be eradicated and the area will be marked as slum free on the slum management portal.

Slum Management Task Force

Although, our proposed solution is highly automated and required little human involvement, we still need human support to maintain the system effectively. For that purpose we propose a working force that could be named as “Slum Management Task Force (SMTF)”.

The SMTF will perform the following activities regularly:

Ø  Create , Update and maintain the central database and the web portal

Ø  Randomly checking the inhabitants for possible rules violation

Ø  Working with the law enforcement agencies

Ø  Making every policies and  actions publicly available and taking public feedback.

Single governing body for long term strategic implementation

The country does not have a single governing body for policy implementation and development monitoring on urbanization and urban poverty. There are between 16 and 40 different bodies involved in one way or another in urban matters in Dhaka with little coordination and planning. As a result, there are major gaps in services and infrastructure ranging from weak electrical supply to inadequate land and housing options. As a result the poor people find no alternative. For that reason, a strong collaborative governing body is needed for long term strategic development and to collaborate between NGOs and Government’s own developing projects.

Employment, Clustered Village and Cottage Industry

Government should take the vast unused land beside and around the metropolitan area or from the big river islands of Padma, Meghna & Jamuna and build new infrastructure for clustered village with massive cottage industry.

The focus of this project will have following key factors:

l  Solve housing problem for the homeless and working poor.

l  Solve employment problems for the poor and disabled people including street beggars

l  Provide a constant income source for the government from foreign export

l  Solve the overpopulation problem of Dhaka City

Successful implementation of this project will dramatically change the life of millions of people and end the poverty right away. Strong policies will need to be adopted for an effective clustered village and common features such as free schools and clinics must be constructed in each village. Optional features such as a piece of land for each family could be included as well.

Bibliography

 (BIDS), B. I. (2005). Estimation of the Size of Street Children and their Projection for Major Urban Areas of Bangladesh . Unicef .

Bureau, D. M. (2010). National Plan for Disaster Management 2010-2015. Dhaka: Disaster Management & Relief Division, Government of Peoples Republic of Bangladesh.

Homelessness. (2014, Mar 23). Retrieved from Wikipedia.com: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness#cite_note-1

Mahmud, A. H. (2013, Octobor 8). 44 % of Dhaka people homeless. Retrieved from Dhaka Tribune: http://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2013/oct/08/44-dhaka-people-homeless

THE VAGRANCY ACT,1943. (n.d.). Retrieved from Laws of Bangladesh: http://bdlaws.minlaw.gov.bd/sections_detail.php?id=199&sections_id=1837

Tracey Pérez Koehlmoos, Md. Jasim Uddin, Ali Ashraf, and Mashida Rashid. (2009). Homeless in Dhaka: Violence, Sexual Harassment, and Drug-abuse. Dhaka: INTERNATIONAL CENTRE FOR DIARRHOEAL DISEASE RESEARCH, BANGLADESH.

ভবঘুরে ও নিরাশ্রয় ব্যক্তি (পুনর্বাসন) আইন,২০১১. (n.d.). Retrieved from Laws of Bangladesh: http://bdlaws.minlaw.gov.bd/bangla_sections_detail.php?id=1078&sections_id=41523