Karnataka - Bidar   

Of a poor couple and their two fulfilled dreams

Rishikesh Bahadur Desai

A transformation has come about in the lives of landless farm workers by the efforts of the Swiss Development Corporation and the Rajiv Gandhi Rural Housing Corporation

Bidar: Landless agricultural worker Tejamma and her husband Rangagonda lived in a shanty hut that belonged to their zamindar in Aurad taluk. They had two dreams: to send their son to school and to have their own hut.

A social worker came searching for them one sunny afternoon last year. Now, they have got more than what they wanted. They have a pucca house of their own. What is more important is that they themselves built part of it.

This transformation in the lives of the poor has been made possible with the efforts of the Swiss Development Corporation and the Rajiv Gandhi Rural Housing Corporation. They have succeeded in building homes for the houseless, by combining the two time-tested ideas of self-help groups and decentralisation. A pilot project called Houses For The Houseless has been implemented in two taluks of Bidar district.

As part of the first phase, 138 families in five villages of the district have got all-weather houses under the programme.

"This housing scheme is unique. It is not like the government programmes where the Government decides who is houseless and how he should be given a dwelling. The beneficiaries are involved in every stage of our programme. This makes them own up responsibility for the entire process. It gives them a sense of belonging. It also makes the whole process transparent," explains C.S. Vedamani, president of Samarasa, a Bidar-based non-government organisation, which coordinates with various stakeholders of the scheme. "The structure of the scheme is so simple, it can be replicated anywhere in the country," she said.

"It has a holistic strategy that includes selection of beneficiaries through participatory rural appraisal, organising select beneficiaries into self-help groups of houseless members and creation of action groups in the villages. These groups are helped to become self-confident by regular capacity building through meetings, trainings and exposure to model housing programmes. The concept of participatory housing is explained to them," she said.

Meanwhile, the second dream of the Rangagonda couple has also come true. Their son is going to school. "He now comes back having had his midday meal," says Tejamma.

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