Building G. Baiyappanahalli
Spoorthi, Part II: Tracing the Community’s Transformation and its Priorities for Tomorrow
This blog is part of a series mapping the journey of IT for Change’s community intervention project in G.Baiyappanahalli called ‘Spoorthi’. Spoorthi aims to build a spatial data platform, train community youth to engage with it, and strengthen their claims-making capabilities.
“When they first brought us here, there were just empty sites,” a voice from the group said. “We started off with some makeshift huts. This place was far away from everything. All the school going kids had to drop out,” the woman, a child care worker, continued. Another woman, a health worker, recalled, “It was the government and BDA (Bengaluru Development Authority) that brought us here. The area allotted was 10 x 13 sq ft. Small place. It was very difficult. There was no water, no bathroom facilities, no amenities.”
Gathered in the Drishya Kalike Kendra in G.Baiyappanahalli for Spoorthi’s second meeting in April, 2018, the women were recollecting the beginnings of their community, when the neighborhood was created in the 1980s as a result of an ad hoc resettlement where migrant populations from five different parts of Bengaluru were relocated to the area.
It had been a month since Spoorthi’s first meeting, where our team had brainstormed with the community about its concerns and grievances. The community of G. Baiyappanahalli had built itself up from scratch, and the aim for our second interaction was to ensure that the people’s issues and priorities, rooted in their long struggles for their rights, could find representation in the implementation of Spoorthi.
We met in two focus groups. The women’s group had nine members from the community including a teacher, a health worker, two Anganwadi (child care) workers, and a student. The men’s group had a community leader, a technician, a painter, and a student. The community, on its part, illustrated the callousness and neglect of the state in rehabilitating populations to areas without adequate facilities. In this context, our team wished to understand the community’s infrastructural and service delivery issues, with a focus on water and sanitation.
Water
In the meeting, Anjali, a community organizer, explained how initially, there were only two functional bore wells for 650 families living in the area. Women were forced to line up through the night to fetch water. They’d keep themselves up by catching the last movie screening at the local theater, to be awake in time for the water queue in the wee hours of the morning.
The connections to the Cauvery water system, the main source of drinking water in the city of Bengaluru, were only given to the community five years ago. However, currently, only one by-lane in the community has access to this water, and only on Fridays. Most households, therefore, purchase treated-bore well water, which costs them anywhere between Rs.5 to Rs.8 a canister, to meet their drinking water needs.
Sanitation
When the community first moved to G.Baiyappanahalli, there were no toilets in the area, which meant people were forced to practice open defecation. Due to the area’s proximity to military land, those who engaged in open defecation on their property were harassed by the military. Later, the government built community toilets (12 for women and 12 for men) but these toilets lacked ventilation, light or water. As of now, all households have individual toilets that were built by the community by pooling funds. The community toilets have since been demolished and in their place, a bridge school, Drishya Kalike Kendra, for children who drop out of the formal education system, has been built by our field partner, Association for Voluntary Action and Service (AVAS) in collaboration with the community.
Today, every street has four to five sewage chambers through which the household pipes are connected to a main chamber on the street. If the chambers clog, each household contributes Rs.100 to hire someone to fix the problem. The Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board’s (BWSSB) support is limited to the occasional pressure flushing of the sewerage lines, as their trucks are too large to enter the narrow lanes of G. Baiyappanahalli. The women’s focus group also added that the sewage lines get clogged at least once every six months due to rodents in the area.
Public Health
The overall public health in the community has improved significantly since the initial resettlement days. Earlier, the community witnessed many child deaths due to dysentery. Today, such deaths have reduced considerably due to improved sanitation and drinking water facilities. The community has also constituted a health committee which routinely provides them with public health information.
Recreational Spaces
Younger male members brought attention to the lack of recreational spaces in the area. While, there is a playground nearby, it is not accessible to the community youth as it is the property of the Indian Railways. A children’s park was built inside the locality, but it has fallen to abandon, after people began frequenting it to consume alcohol and to smoke.
Connectivity
The railway cross guard is the community’s only path to the outside area. While a flyover has been constructed over the railway crossing, it is not yet open to the public due to litigation between the military and the railway. In a sense, the proximity to both military and railway properties, has significantly affected the community’s development trajectory as it closely affects land use.
Education
In the initial days of the settlement, the children’s formal education was disrupted. Also, private schools were reluctant to admit children from the slum. At that time, (AVAS), with the help of community members, started non formal education sessions for the children. Later, these children were enrolled into government schools while non formal education through Drishya continued simultaneously. Currently, children are able to secure admission in private schools and reputed higher education institutions. The women have also set up self-financing groups to secure funding for higher education of their children.
Land Rights
The one issue that both focus groups unanimously agreed to be the most pressing was the lack of pattas (land right documents). This is still a major worry for the community, even though its members have long turned in their applications with the relevant documents to the BDA for formalizing their claim to their homes. Many people have expanded on the initial 10 x 13 sq ft plot that was allotted to them and have built multi storied houses over time.
“You must be thinking why we keep talking about patta all the time. We don’t have any ground to stand on right now. We can’t tell when they will come and demolish our homes again, where they will dump us again. Let me give you an example. I have spent 4–5 lakhs on building my home in the area allotted, others more. Some are looking to build something through loans and other means. If something happens tomorrow, the loss is ours to bear. Tomorrow they will dump us again and will be in the same situation, that’s why we keep insisting on the patta.” — A community organizer
After our second interaction, we observed that women expressed greater concerns and were more emphatic about the civic issues than men. This could be due to the low turnout of the men’s focus group. However, women in the community possess a high degree of civic awareness as they have been at the forefront of claiming their rights and entitlements. One visible manifestation of this assertive rise is noted in the low prevalence of alcoholism and domestic violence in the community, as compared to the early days of resettlement.
“Initially, the leaders in the community gave us some push back. You are women, why are you doing all this, they would ask us. Don’t do this, they would say. But when they saw the work we were doing, they joined our cause, participated in our meetings, accompanied us to the government offices and everything. Things have improved because of the sangha (women’s group).” — Anganwadi worker
We sensed that as the older generation had lived through turbulent times, their concerns seemed to overshadow those of the younger generation. Realizing this, our team decided to hold a separate focus group with the youth in the community to hear out the civic priorities and take on the state of affairs in their neighborhood.
Overall, the way the community had transformed the area from the initial days of resettlement to the present day is remarkable. G. Baiyappanahalli is set apart from most urban poor communities by, for example, in how it uses closed drain systems instead of open systems by adopting revisions to existing sanitation systems to ensure that waste doesn’t flow into each other’s houses. It has also taken initiatives to address safety issues by setting up a night vigilance and a peace committee in the locality, apart from initiating a health committee, a women’s group, and a youth group. The neglect from the state, the relative isolation due to connectivity issues, and the shared experiences of forced resettlement have resulted in good community cohesion and well-developed self governing mechanisms that serves it in good stead.
Despite these mechanisms, however, the constant threat of eviction and the grim uncertainty over claims of land ownership looms largely over the community’s head. Our team at IT for Change has recognized these pressing priorities as larger part of the intervention we seek to do through this project. It remains our hope that the data commons that is sought to be built through Spoorthi, can go a long way in strengthening the community’s claims to the neighborhood and establish their right to the city.
Read Spoorthi’s first blog, and follow this space for more stories of change from the community.
