Failing to complete construction of shelter homes for the urban homeless as per schedule, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) is now wringing its hands trying to figure out where to accommodate the city’s destitute persons.
GHMC Commissioner M. Dana Kishore had issued instructions recently for identifying empty government buildings such as community halls and model markets, and shift the homeless there. The corporation has also flitted through a hurried one-day survey on Thursday in order to identify the homeless in the GHMC area, and came up with a figure of 1,152 in all the 30 circles. Of them, 766 were men and 325 women, besides 46 children and 15 senior citizens.
The figure of homeless in official records, as per “rapid surveys” done from time to time, is coming down by the year. In October 2010, when the first survey was carried out, the total homeless identified stood close to 3,000. During second phase of the survey in 2014, 605 shelterless persons were identified near government hospitals, all attendants of patients admitted for treatment. Another rapid survey last summer brought the figure further down to 1,516.
Tardy progress
However, the 2011 Census puts the number of shelterless persons at 37,587 in the city. At the rate of 50 persons in one shelter, the city needs over 750 shelter homes. GHMC, which has pulled off a feat by constructing three underpasses and two flyovers at various locations in just one year’s time under the Strategic Road Development Plan (SRDP), could build only three shelter homes during the last eight years.
Aside from these homes constructed specifically for patients’ attendants in Mahaveer Hospital, Niloufer Hospital and Government Maternity Hospital, Koti, the corporation could scrape together 12 more buildings at various locations on lease. All the 15 homes are sheltering only 491 persons as of now.
The Supreme Court, which had ordered in 2010 that every city with over a lakh population should provide shelter homes for its destitute population at the rate of one home per a lakh population, expressed severe dissatisfaction at the state of implementation. A committee under the apex court reported in 2017 that the implementation in Hyderabad was ‘poor’.
Survey for identification of urban homeless has not been conducted, nor is the mapping done for the homeless or availability of land for the shelters, the committee has noted. GHMC officials blame it on the scarcity of land within the city. The corporation has restricted itself to construction of shelters within hospitals wherever land is granted. Seven such locations were identified, of which three are operational.
Four more, respectively at Osmania General Hospitals, NIMS, Govt. Hospital, Nampally, and ENT Hospital, Koti will be ready in two months, officials said.
The Centre has sanctioned 80% of the project cost under the National Urban Livelihoods Mission, while the remaining is being footed by the State government.