Bombay pavement dwellers learn to fight back with Corso’s aid

Press, 13 June 1986, Page 18

Bombay pavement dwellers learn to fight back with Corso’s aid

By

GLENN HASZARD

People in Third World countries are sometimes accused of not doing anything to help themselves. This is a convenient myth. There are countless examples of groups devoting their time and energy to the sometimes thankless task of helping the needy. One such group is S.P.A.R.C., the Society for Promotion of Area Resource Centres, which was set up in Bombay, India, in December, 1984. S.P.A.R.C. has a special link with New Zealand. Since November last year it has been a project supported by the aid and development agency, Corso.

It was formed by a small number of well-educated women, three of whom had social work diplomas. In 1981, the city authorities, using a nineteenth century law, moved in on thousands of Bombay’s pavement dwellers — people living in huts on pavements — and demolished their shelters, forcing them to flee to other parts of the city or back to the villages from where many had come.

But going back to the villages was not a solution. Many had no jobs and no hope of jobs there and could not rely on help from their poor relatives for long. So they drifted back to the city where there was at least some chance of ekeing out a meagre existence.

S.P.A.R.C. set to work not in the well-known Mother Theresatype of aid by taking people in and providing care or food. Its approach was to listen to the people, particularly the women, and to help them to help themselves.

One way that gained a lot of

feedback was to take photographs and give them to the people. Lively discussions were the inevitable results. Little by little the pavement dwellers let S.P.A.R.C. know of their immediate needs, such as getting ration cards, gaining faster access to hospitals, and knowing where to go to get help. Corso’s gift of $2OOO received a New Zealand Government subsidy of $6OOO and the money was given personally to S.P.A.R.C. in December last year by Ms Dell Small, a lecturer in political science at the University of Canterbury and a a staunch supporter of Corso.

She had heard of their work when attending a seminar in the Philippines, and took the opportunity to find for herself about them when in India.

She said that in July last year the city authorities announced that they would be clearing pavements of the “encroachments,” following the decision of the Indian Supreme Court that eviction was legal as long as “prior notice” was given and the demolitions were carried out in as “humane” a way as possible. S.P.A.R.C. organised a census which revealed among other things that the pavement dwellers were not the itinerants that many thought them to be; that they did not use the city facilities such as buses because

they could not afford to; and that nearly two-thirds of them were in paid employment. Copies of the report were given to the pavement dwellers, who were closely involving in the whole process. They came to realise they were not alone, that thousands of others were in the same “boat,” and that they had a right to exist somewhere. The city authorities together with S.P.A.R.C. are now seeking a method to clear the pavements in such a way as to comply with the Supreme Court ruling that it be done in a “humane” way. In other words, adequate arrangements must be made for rehousing or resettlement, minimising misery and chaos. The census report also highlighted some deficiencies in rural development policy, for a policy that results in migration of the rural poor to the cities is not an effective one. So the problem is one for the central Government, the state government, and the city authorities. Ms Small says S.P.A.R.C. works mainly through women because they have found from experience that that is how things can be done effectively. “It’s never done in a confrontational way. They don’t have a feminist billboard, so to speak” They work at the grassroots level, dealing with problems as they arise. Eighteen months ago before S.P.A.R.C. was formed the “Mafia” was collecting a few paise (Indian coins) from everyone who wanted to go to the toilet It should have been free because it was provided by the city. The “Mafia” needed to be got out of

the toilets but who was powerful enough to challenge them? “It was the pavement dwellers who started a boycott as a result of some organisation. They did it by getting the children to collect paper from the streets, putting the waste in the paper, and depositing it in rubbish bins. The council then had to deal with it.”

Another example of the method used by S.P.A.R.C. hap-

pened when a pavement dweller who had tuberculosis refused treatment. His wife, after talking with some of the other women, began to realise that her children might catch the disease. She put pressure on him until he went back to his village. He did not get treatment and when he returned after eight months he became very ill and died.

Within three months most of the pavement-dwellers had overcome any reserve about having an injection. Ms Small says that the work S.P.A.R.C. does is the sort that Corso likes to identify with, both overseas and in New Zealand.

“It’s the quality of Corso aid that counts. It knows now that here is a responsible, reliable,

innovative group which has thorough credentials, is incorporated as a society, and has audited accounts, so that there is no doubt that the money will be used for the right purpose. “But the distinctive thing about Corso is that we will allow the people to say what they will use the money for. If a group is going to work at the grassroots the best help it can get is that

which enables it to respond to the needs which emerge.” Ms Small says she found the project an inspiration. S.P.A.R.C. is just one of a number of community groups throughout the world supported with donations from New Zealanders by Corso. It is one of the groups which will benefit from the 1986 New Zealand Aid appeal this week.

“Encroachments”

on pavements