Call for urgent shelters for the homeless
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COMMENTS 
The mortality rate amongst homeless people in India is unacceptably high, prompting calls for urgent shelters for the homeless from the Special Commissioner to the Supreme Court
Highlighting the poor condition of the homeless, Special Commissioner to the Supreme Court Harsh Mander, who is also a member of the National Advisory Council (NAC), has called for a community-based approach to cater to their needs.
“On studying the plight of homeless people in New Delhi, we found that they had to pay for every amenity that those with homes take for granted: food, bathing, using the toilet; they had to even borrow blankets for a fee in winter,” he said.
Speaking at a three-day national seminar on Perspectives on Mental Illness in India, organised by The Banyan Academy of Leadership in Mental Health, Chennai, Mander said the NAC may push to get orders from the Supreme Court on a national policy to create legal rights for the homeless. Though the policy has been drafted, state governments are reluctant to adopt it citing paucity of resources, he added.
Contrary to public perception, less than 10% live by begging, because they consider food given as charity to be humiliating. “Death rates were five times higher for homeless people as against others in the country,” Mander said while reiterating the need for shelters for the homeless.
Speaking about a multifaceted approach, Mander urged the government to create an enabling physical space for the rehabilitation of the homeless. He also talked about the need for dignified open shelters and recovery shelters for old and destitute homeless persons, especially women and children.
“You can’t ask a woman who has been living on the street for years and has a familiar system of survival to move into a strange shelter. There’s a need to build a rapport first and gain her trust that comes with a ‘heart’ and ‘spirit’ to understand human suffering,” he said.
“Chennai has a rare phenomenon of homelessness. For instance, five generations of a family have been living on the same stretch of pavement for ages,” he said.
Vandana Gopikumar, founder, The Banyan, said Tamil Nadu has 86,472 homeless people according to Census 1991, and went on to explain: “The devastating combination of poverty, mental illness and homelessness makes them the ‘invisible people’ -- marginalised and excluded.”
About the need for a ‘caring collective initiative’ for the rehabilitation of homeless people with mental illnesses, Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Sciences Director Nimesh Desai said there was a need to strengthen existing services with a focus on mental disorders, along with research and policy initiatives.
Prabha Sridevan, a Madras High Court judge, suggested that the right to housing should become a constitutional right, as is in South Africa. India’s homeless have been denied any constitutional right, she said.
In a first, the Delhi government has recently started a special survey to identify the city’s homeless, as part of a United Nations-supported project ‘Innovation Support for Social Protection’, and aims at giving people equal access to social welfare schemes started by the government for the poor.
The identified homeless will be included in the ongoing census and will also be made a part of several social schemes started in the capital for the poor. They will be given special identity cards to ensure that they benefit from the schemes.
According to officials, this first-of-its-kind survey in the country that involves 24 government and non-government organisations, will be completed in two months. A team of 150 enumerators will carry out the survey in 15 divisions of the city.
Source: The Hindu, July 4, 2010
The Indian Express, July 4, 2010
Hindustan Times, July 3, 2010