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Cold and homeless by Bharat Dogra

Recent directions of the Delhi High Court to improve conditions for homeless people housed in Delhi’s night shelters need to be widely welcomed. At the same time, it should be realised that the problems of the nearly four-million homeless deserve wider and more regular attention as the lack of basic facilities for them at a national level is simply too glaring.

Pucca and permanent shelters which can be used throughout the year are available for less than 10% of the homeless. Extra tent accommodation is available only during winter.

Although all homeless people comprise a high vulnerability group, women, children and destitutes among them are particularly so. The problems homeless women face in meeting their sanitation needs are more serious. Similarly their safely and modesty is badly threatened all the time.

In fact some homeless girls are known to dress up as boys to avoid sexual exploitation. Despite these threats there are very few shelters for homeless women and girls, in fact hardly any for women. Even male homeless children face frequent threat of sexual exploitation as well as intimidation from criminal elements. The chance of being lured into several addictions is quite high.

A survey of Ashray Adhikar Abhiyan in Delhi revealed that most homeless people work hard and send back their savings to their poor families in remote villages. Helping the urban homeless thus indirectly helps some of the most poverty-hit families in rural areas.

The challenge ahead is to provide adequate shelters which provide essential facilities and safety to the homeless. Special needs of rickshaw-pullers , cart-pullers , vendors and water-vendors for safekeeping of their means of livelihood should be met. Separate shelters for women, children and families which meet their needs should be built. When many families are to be sheltered , shelters for men and women can be built separately but close to each other.

A review of the struggles of pavement dwellers by Bishnu N Mohapatra says in the context of Mumbai, "The case of Mumbai’s pavement dwellers clearly suggests that a group of people who are economically poor and socially marginal find it difficult to make their mark on state policies — even the ones that directly influence their lifechances. Here, mediation by voluntary organisations is of crucial significance." 

This study adds, "There are different ways by which a voluntary organisation can do this. For instance, it can act independently on behalf of these people and put pressure on appropriate institutions, in which case it does not need to mobilise the people except to the extent that it can ascertain , aggregate and represent their true interests .

Thus, the people on whose behalf the organisation speaks may not necessarily be active participants in the process. Another way would be for voluntary organisations to raise the issue of marginal groups by mobilising them and work towards enhancing their agency in the public sphere."

Instead of creating such a clear-cut division , however, these roles need not be so exclusive of each other. While on the one hand there is a clear need for policy intervention on behalf of the homeless on many fronts, at an early stage it may not be possible to mobilise the entire community of the homeless people in this effort particularly in a vast city. However with the passage of time the active participation of homeless people should steadily increase.

A related question is that of rights-based approach or service-based approach. Till some years back voluntary organisations followed a service-based approach which provides at best only some temporary relief . In contrast rights-based one emphasises the ability of people to obtain more stable gains as a matter of right.

While fully accepting the appropriateness and primacy of a rights-based approach, this should be supported by providing some essential services . Sometimes the homeless are carried away to beggars’ homes just to fulfil targets. While laws should be used strictly against confirmed criminals, they should not be used against the innocent homeless somehow earning a difficult but honest livelihood . Unfair and arbitrary laws, frequently used in this way, should be revised.

A collaborative effort of the government and civil society groups can achieve much to reduce the pain of being homeless. While the need for this is most acute during the winter months, we should not forget the homeless at other times of the year.

(The writer is a Fellow , Institute of Social Sciences , New Delhi)