Strengthening Civil Society Voices on Urban Poverty in India

National Consultation held on 24-25 August 2011, New Delhi

Economic development in India has resulted in metropolitan cities attracting large migratory populations. India’s cities have become its engines of growth. This rapid pace of urbanization in India has not been matched by public policies to tackle issues related to the development and planning of urban areas. Even though the 74th constitutional amendments brought elected municipal governance to nearly 4500 towns and cities in 1992, the institutional design, resources, capabilities and mandates of these urban local bodies have hardly changed in the last two decades.

Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA) and Society for Promotion of Area Resource Centres (SPARC) have come together to engage in a two year long project titled “Strengthening Civil Society Voices on Urban Poverty in India” (funded by the Ford Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation) rooted in the context of growing urbanization, urban poverty and malgovernance of cities, and based on the experiences that each has had in addressing the issues of urban poverty.

National policies focus much of their attention on rural poverty; as a result, understanding of urban poverty has been inadequate. The 2001 census estimated that nearly 23 per cent of India’s urban population was poor. Not only is the basis for estimating this poverty been somewhat inadequate, even the actual estimates have been contested. Typically equated with slums and squatter settlements, recognition of urban poverty, its scale, manifestation, causes and consequences remain obscure in current development planning processes. Practical activities undertaken by some organizations in the recent past have highlighted multiple forms of urban poverty – homelessness, squatters, street/pavement dwellers, etc.

The first national programme for urban development known as JnNURM (Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission) was launched in 2005 with two sub-missions – one focused on urban infrastructure and governance reform (administered by Ministry of Urban Development) and the second focused on basic services to the urban poor (administered by Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation). However, cities and state governments had no past experience in undertaking inclusive urban renewal and development. The involvement of citizens, specially the urban poor, in design, planning and implementation of city-level investments was almost non-existent. Many of the schemes of housing for the urban poor have been designed and implemented by builders without consultation with and understanding of the needs of the urban poor themselves.

One of the major inadequacies in taking forward the agenda of inclusion and active participation of the urban poor in these programmes has been weak civil society engagement with issues of urban poverty and urban governance. The lack of a national network of civil society or even a sub sectoral coalition that focuses on these issues on a sustained basis became evident when the first national consultation of civil society actors was convened by PRIA in January 2010.

The announcement of a programme of ‘slum free cities’ or RAY (Rajiv Awas Yojna) by the UPA II Government in 2009 brought some ray of hope. This programme intended to provide secure housing and reliable sanitation to all urban poor. Currently, the detailed planning for operationalization of RAY is underway and it is at this juncture that the Planning Commission has begun drafting the Approach Paper for the 12th Five Year Plan. This is an opportune time for civil society to give inputs which might feed into the policy process. Civil society needs to articulate its voice in ensuring that the urban poor are not only included but also drive the implementation of RAY.

“Strengthening Civil Society Voices on Urban Poverty in India” aims to orient, support and enable CSOs in 30 cities of 6 states to engage with city governments for planning RAY in Year 1 and deepen engagement in a further 20 cities in Year 2. State level and national consultations and policy briefings will help advocacy efforts with planning and government officials. Practice-oriented studies will help bring best practices to engaged CSOs to enable them to learn from each other’s challenges and opportunities. Web based communications is the primary strategy to enhance reach of the project learnings to various stakeholders.

National Consultation held on 24-25 August 2011, New Delhi

The first national consultation under the project “Strengthening Civil Society Voices on Urban Poverty in India” was held on 24-25 August 2011 in New Delhi. It brought together a broad spectrum of civil society organizations and actors – organizations of the urban poor, local NGOs, research institutions, media, policy makers, urban planners, researchers, etc – to debate ways in which government programmes and policies can be shaped from a citizen’s perspective.

The welcome and introduction to the objectives of the consultation was undertaken by Dr. Rajesh Tandon, President, PRIA, wherein he stated that the consultation was organized with the hope that the issue of urban poverty and problems faced by the urban poor would finally be acknowledged by policy makers. Ms. Sheela Patel, Founder Director, SPARC stated that the consultation was a part of the strategic planning that would help make everyone aware of RAY and would help in forging the way ahead. Ms. Renana Jhabwala, Chairperson, SEWA Bharat highlighted the issue of partial citizenship awarded to the urban poor and emphasized the plight of the urban poor in relation to the denial of their right to work, stay and right over the land. Mr. Jockin Arputham, President of National Slum Dwellers Federation (NSDF) stated that there is a need to give prominence to slum dwellers in civil society. He emphasized that the issue of slum dwellers should not be clubbed with issues of the urban poor and that slums should be recognized as part of the city landuse/cityscape.

Michael Slingsby and Shubagatho Dasgupta from SNPUPR (Support to National Policies for Urban Poverty Reducation) made a presentation describing the features, objectives, components and targets of RAY. This generated an interesting question and answer session on RAY.

In the last session of the day, community based organizations shared experiences of their work and its connection with RAY.

On the second day of the consultation groups were formed on the basis of community participation, land tenure, in-situ upgradation and livelihoods to discuss and present the issues and concerns regarding these individual issues. The group discussion was facilitated by Mr Sundar Burra, with Ms. Sheela Patel summing up the session wherein she emphasized the importance of streamlining all the information gathered so that critical issues could be highlighted.

The second day also saw a dialogue with officials of Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation (HUPA), Government of India. Ms. Aruna Sundararajan, Joint Secretary, HUPA replied to queries and comments regarding RAY. In her experience she has realized that community participation is the basis of every intervention without which any programme or project cannot be implemented, and urged all NGOs/CBOs present to be a part of the pilot test that would be carried out in order to strengthen and give voice to the informal groups within the community. Ms. Sheela Patel proposed that there should be a grievance redressal system in place at every stage of RAY and Dr. Tandon concluded the session by stating that the real challenge in RAY lies in interfacing and getting things done by the municipalities.

In the closing session participants gave suggestions regarding the future strategies and next steps which need to be worked upon. All of them agreed that participation of civil society in RAY was necessary for its successful implementation.

The consultation was summarized by Dr. Tandon. In his view, RAY has enormous potential in improving the state of the urban poor as it is the first scheme that talks about providing security of tenure to the urban poor.

To read the concept note and design of the National Consultation, click here, English orHindi