SUMMARY

This Report was initiated to find a comprehensive solution that addresses the issues that have led to depletion of resources in metropolitan cities. Primary among them is the Supportive Population (Slum dwellers) that comprises about 40% of the city's population. These people are migrants into the city. The city cannot survive without them and neither can it sustain them since they are a huge burden on the infrastructure and resources of the city. Future planning policies have to be, thus, designed around these "Have nots" rather than the "Haves". Further, the government has no money today to ensure basic amenities to all its residents despite the fact that the individuals in the country are rich. There is a lot of unaccountable money being generated in the metropolitan cities of India, which is a result of inappropriate policies of the government in the first place. Ways and means of channelising this money into the mainstream and redefining the existing government revenue collection systems, need to be looked into. Inappropriate land choice and the planning norms adopted are one of the primary factors which lead to a host of problems requiring complex legislation and centralised management systems. Land as a resource placed solely at the disposal of the government compounds the complications further. Within the existing systems of planning, principles of engineering, management of infrastructure and resources as propagated by the government a comprehensive workable solution would be difficult to find.

Alternate approaches including traditional practices were rationalised, studied, developed, policies formulated and refined to arrive at solutions that would ensure a sustainable human settlement design. Administrative support for the initiative was provided by the Slum Department of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, while the Anangpur Building Centre gave all the technical inputs. The proposed policy addressed the complex heterogeneous society typical of the metropolitan cities - and had to be wide based proposing rationalised solutions and directions. The Engineers of the Slum Department have been sitting paucity of funds as the major reason why no solutions for the Supportive Population exist. The Slum Department gets a total amount of Rs.44000 per slum dwelling, through various loans and funding agencies for relocation or in situ up gradation of the degraded tenements. Given the large disparity in the land and construction cost along with the standard practices according to the Public Works Department Manual it is in fact impossible to find a solution. This formed the basis of this report - that the solution does not lie in increasing the amount of grants and loans for funding the slum relocation projects but in re-rationalising the forms of governance, technologies and management systems to arrive at sustainable solutions for the future. All settlements should be self-sustaining with the government in the role of a Facilitator rather than that of a Provider.

All agencies responsible for the civic and infrastructure facilities in the city were included at every stage of the discussion and this provided vital insights into the functioning of the government. This helped set the priorities of the report which were based on the existing and projected state of the resources of the city as they stand. The objective of the report was to define means that could help make the city self-sustaining and empower the people to look after their own facilities. Traditionally, it has been seen that the best form of policing is a form of social interchecks. Failure of the present system of policing, tax collection etc. just goes to prove the same. Further a system of social interchecks is possible only if the community is empowered and made responsible for its own services. These priorities were refined through research, discussions, a series of pilot projects, seminars and symposia.

The report also aimed to find a comprehensive solution to the problems confronting the metropolitan cities of developing countries by studying Delhi as a case in point. Traditional practices were rationalised and guidelines drawn for all aspects of development including finance, infrastructure, planning, disposal of sewage, land management and forms of governance. Archetypal cases were selected in Delhi and pilot projects were done incorporating different aspects of the Report. Over a period of time these settlements were carefully monitored and studied. Their results were assimilated, refined and put to test through other pilot projects. This process was documented, other alternate forms of technology, management and governance were incorporated. The final results and inferences drawn have been compiled in this Report.

The bureaucratic heads of the civic and infrastructure agencies of the Government of Delhi were involved at every stage of the entire process. In executing the pilot projects and subsequent discussions there has been stiff opposition by the bureaucrats and the engineers. In fact, in most cases these proposals have been rejected and shot down. Resources for implementation of the pilot project were mobilised through the Slum and JJ Department and the corpus of the Nizamuddin Building Centre, which was the implementing agency. The Anangpur Building Centre in isolation financed the report. Mr. Anil Laul, of Anangpur Building Centre and the Additional Commissioner Slum and JJ Department, Mr. Manjit Singh, in person were the forerunners in formulating the objectives and implementing the initiative.

Resistance to the initiative came primarily from the engineers of the Slum Department since the report advocates alternate technologies and systems of planning that do not conform to the Public Works Department manual which is their Bible (and has resulted in the chaos that is today). As a result of this resistance the personnel of Anangpur Building Centre were assaulted and their vehicles burnt up during study of the finished pilot projects. Public Demonstrations were also staged against them. Financial dues for implementing the pilot projects were not cleared as a result of which the Nizamuddin Building Centre had to close down. After considerable effort over a period of four years the dues of Nizamuddin Building Centre have been cleared and the said Centre is being relocated at Jaunapur. It is proposed that a major exhibition Centre be put up for awareness generation amongst the people. A major area is being constructed for training manpower so that the Slum Rehabilitation scheme for 3600 families (which is adjacent to the site) can be implemented using all the technologies developed here. Students from various schools of architecture would be trained at this Centre for dissemination of all these principles in a comprehensive manner.

Through the pilot projects it was repeatedly proved that the technologies being proposed are cost effective and only by adopting them can the Delhi Government afford to provide housing to the Supportive Population of Delhi and decongest the city. Each aspect of the report was painstakingly proved through pilot projects, meetings and discussions and the government was compelled by their success to incorporate them in their policies. For instance, cluster planning was initiated through pilot projects and is now an accepted system of planning for not only the Supportive Population but its effect on the behavioral pattern of children, sense of security and community togetherness for all strata of the society is also an accepted norm today.

The objectives as stated in the Report were realised up to a very large extent, considering that a pilot project for resettlement of 3600 slum families planned according on these principles has been sanctioned by the Standing Committee of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi and is being built. This report has been instrumental in the formulating the policies laid out by the Government of Delhi for the year 2010. A movement of the people called People's First was launched comprising of the intelligentsia and the renowned personnel of Delhi to further the recommendations regarding forms of governance and empowering people. A Public Interest Litigation was filed in the Supreme Court of India in January 1998 to this regard. Aspects from this report especially pertaining to water and ground water recharge have been accepted in the recently held Regional Preparatory Conference for the 6th Session of the UNCSD Building a regional consensus on sustainable development (Focusing on Forestry and Fresh Water management). Studies have been conducted on the earlier completed pilot projects and a definite improvement in the living conditions of the former slum dwellers has been found. The planning has reduced the degree of encroach ability, tradability of the residential units and the community is managing their resources far more efficiently than the government thus proving the government's role as a facilitator rather than a provider.

The policies and technologies proposed in the Report are by and large applicable to all metropolitan cities in developing nations. They can in principle be adopted anywhere. A major contention of the report is that standardisation leads to unsustainable solutions and compounding of problems. Man tries to force upon nature, solutions that are standardised and based on the contextual specifications of another location. In trying to negate the negative effect of standardisation further imposed solutions only aggravate the problem. Therefore, solutions proposed in this report are principally rationalised but have to be detailed depending on the social, geographic and economic location