Truly sad situation in our neighboring country. Bharatis need to quit f@rting around about this newfound greatness and help these unfortnate people.
Tsunami victims still on the streets
By Paddy Maguire
BBC News, Madras
More than 1,200 families are still living on the streets of Madras (Chennai) nearly a year after the Asian tsunami tore into the city’s coastline.
With only crude shelter and negligible provision from NGOs, the families say they are being harassed by police and are threatened with violence by people who want them off the streets.
The state government has implemented an $8m scheme for permanent housing to resettle most of the 44,000 tsunami-affected families.
But those who were renting properties that were destroyed last December have so far fallen through the net.
They are without even the most basic of temporary shelters.
With no proof of address they are unable to work, register for aid or enrol their children at school.
Rehabilitation
“Without employment our children are suffering. They are catching malaria and suffering from fever. We cannot afford medicines.” says R Nila, who lives with her husband, his mother and the couple’s three children in Sreenivasapuram in the south of the city.
“The government has washed its hands of us. It’s like we don’t exist.”
Her baby son’s skin is puckered with mosquito bites. He cries continually.
With the monsoon season just around the corner, their makeshift tent on a pavement that borders the beach is woefully inadequate.
Pools of recent rainwater stagnate under foot.
About 150 families are struggling to survive in this area alone.
Ravi Parayannar of the Puratchi Baratham liaises between the locals and the government.
“There is only one water tank and one toilet facility for the exclusive use of the women. If there was proper shelter they would go to work and rebuild their lives,” he says.
Semi-permanent shelters
In recent weeks families have demonstrated outside the Madras Collectorate to demand shelter, basic facilities and, ultimately, rehabilitation.
SS Sundari of the tsunami section for the collectorate said “We have proposed to construct semi-permanent structures in the south of the city for these victims. Land will be provided.”
However NGOs involved in reconstruction projects across the city remain convinced that no such deal has been made.
“There is no land and no space yet provided for these particular families. NGOs distributed tarpaulins after the tsunami last year but there is nothing more” says RM Nathan of the Peoples’ Action Movement.
Elsewhere affected families face similar problems. In the north of the city in Kargil Nagar, a colony of families in temporary shelters is waiting to be moved into semi-permanent housing.
It is a heavily industrialised area on the outskirts of the city.
The caustic emissions from nearby chemical plants fuse uneasily with the lingering smell of human waste.
A sea of grey tents extends into the distance, plumes of smoke rise from gas stoves as rain saturates the muddy ground.
After a fire in June which destroyed the shelters provided by NGOs, some 2,200 families are once more struggling to cope with regular floods on the low-lying land allocated by the government.
“Shelter has been the biggest problem, but we are eating. NGOs have been looking after us and providing food. We are supposed to be moving into semi-permanent shelters some time next month.”
Neglected families
Kanchana is 28 and lives in the two-by-three metre tent with six other family members.
Once these families move into the semi-permanent structures, life will improve dramatically. Water, electricity and toilet facilities will be provided. But it is an uphill struggle.
“If we lobby the government they do start these jobs, but only if we pressurise them. They have put up shelters, but they are poor quality and in unsuitable areas” says SD Rajendran, convenor of the Madras NGOs Coordination Council.
"These low-lying areas are the problem. The land has to be improved before construction can start.
"We have filed expert reports and made suggestions that the land must be raised three feet and adequate drainage implemented. The government has accepted this.
“Once the people are settled in proper shelters on the right land we can start the process of livelihood promotion and get them back to work.”
With the first anniversary of the tsunami only a few months away, the NGOs are aiming to have up to 3,700 families properly housed within a month.
Those neglected families in the south of the city can only hope they are offered similar treatment before the north-east monsoon begins in earnest.
Story from BBC NEWS:
Published: 2005/09/09 14:42:28 GMT