The Hindu : New Delhi News : Off-campus housing of DU girls to get easy

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Thursday, May 15, 2008
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Off-campus housing of DU girls to get easy

Parul Sharma

Volunteers of women’s support groups to tell students about their rights as paying guests
Students to be briefed about basic information on living on rent and how to deal with landlords

NEW DELHI: Delhi University’s women’s support group “Pehal” will soon embark on a project to compile a data base of off-campus housing for girl students who do not get a hostel accommodation while they are pursuing their studies at the University.

Volunteers of the group will soon be trained and they will launch their operations with the start of the new academic year this mid-July.

“We will train the volunteers and they will distribute the questionnaires to second year and third year girl students at different colleges. The group will tell the students about their rights as paying guests,” said Pehal founding member Shormishtha Panja, who is also the Dean of Arts at the varsity.

“While information will be collected from the second and third year girls, those who will take admission in the first year will also be briefed about some basic things like taking a receipt after paying the house rent and also on how to deal with landlords, some of whom can be unscrupulous. We have had one case when two girls were duped of Rs. 20,000,” she added.

The exercise was conducted last year also when Pehal group members distributed questionnaires and collected information from girl students of colleges like Gargi, Satyawati, Kirori Mal, Kamla Nehru and Janki Devi. This year the project would be more comprehensive and there is a possibility that the University might provide funds for making such a data base.

“We will begin with the North Campus since that is the densest area as far as students’ accommodation is concerned. Many students stay in areas like Mukherjee Nagar, Vijay Nagar, Outram Lines and Kingsway Camp. This data base will give the University an idea about the students living in accommodations off the campus, the kind of astronomical rents they pay and will bring some accountability on the part of the landlords also,” said Prof. Panja.

With a core group of ten and several members, Pehal also organises monthly meetings, awareness programmes , talks and discussions for women. It also runs a 24X7 helpline – 9999273342 -- for the University girl students.

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