Bulldozing the right to shelter

Islamabad is the only planned city in Pakistan. A master plan was conceived by a Greek town planner’s firm of architects, Konstantinos Apostolos Doxiadis based on a grid plan and it included all the current sectors consisting of four subsectors each. The arrangement included residential areas, commercial areas, schools and hospitals etc for each subsector. For some odd reason that firm did not most likely care or perhaps find it important enough at that time to map an area for the followers quarters for people working as cleaners, janitors, sanitary workers, carpenters, laborers etc but for obvious reasons, their presence was the essence of the city. In 1960 when Islamabad was constructed as the capital, these workers would come to work in the city from Rawalpindi. With time as Islamabad started expanding, there came a need of more “helpers” and it began to become hard for them to afford their commute to Islamabad every day. That is when they started developing Kachi Abaadis (slums) in the capital of Pakistan. Since Islamabad had only two sectors back then, The CDA (Capital Development Authority) didn’t prevent the slums to be developed. CDA recognized their need to live in the places that were vacant back then and did not make an effort to stop them.  Ultimately this became a routine and different people made use of this idea by grabbing the lands and selling to poor people on nominal amount to establish kachi abadis.  The first two slums in Islamabad were established in F-6 and F-7 which were sooner recognized by CDA as legalized slums.

Derived from NCPC Profiling of Katchi Abadis ,The Capital Development Authority (CDA) has registered eleven Kachi Abadis in different locations of Islamabad but in actual there are total of thirty four Kachi Abadis in centre as well as peripheries of Islamabad. They have been provided with electricity and gas as well. Kachi Abaadi dwellers are from all over the country. Majority of the population is comprised of Christian community originating from central Punjab. The number of Punjabi communities like Potoharies, Sheiks, Awans and other communities has jointly constituted the population of Kachi Abadis in Islamabad. Afghan refugees, Pakhtoons from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and some of the families from Balochistan are also part of the population. Almost each family member unfortunately even including children earns for their families but their monthly income is very low.

Understanding the situation; there are some questions that arise. On what criteria were the slums legalized as compared to the ones that are considered illegal, why did Iesco and SNGPL provide electricity and gas to slums without confirming status of the property? Why wasn’t CDA aware of the new slums being developed and if they were, why didn’t they stop them at that time?

Anyhow, the issue has a long recurring history, but the recent episode escalated this February when the Islamabad High Court issued an order for the removal of “illegal settlements” from Islamabad. Surveys were conducted, eviction notices were issued, and search operations were launched in katchi abadis.  Bureaucrats, politicians, and the judiciary have joined hands to launch eviction drives that will affect over 100,000 residents of the katchi abadis of Islamabad. This order has created a tension in the houses of the urban poor and their protests have also been stopped by police and even rangers were called to stop the poor from complaining. The officials claim that the 30-odd katchi abadis of Islamabad are illegal settlements that have emerged due to encroachments on private and public land, and these abadis harbor criminals and terrorists. Well criminals and terrorists have been found living in huge compounds too but it’s evidently not fair to close down the entire colony for it. The police should of course be used to address such issues. About the legality of these slums, several constitutional provisions, laws, and policies deal with them, including provincial katchi abadi acts, the National Housing Policy and the National Katchi Abadi Policy of 2001. According to these documents katchi abadis are ‘informal settlements comprising more than 40 houses’, which can be registered and regularized, based on when they were built. The preferred official policy is to improve the slums where they are, but if any slum is to be removed for a particular reason, that can only be done after working out a detailed resettlement plan in consultation with the residents.

In 2006 CDA did propose a plan of developing a colony with three story buildings in the apparent legalized slums including French colony but due to financial restraints and some resistance from the colony people it was never implemented.

The right to housing or shelter is recognized universally as one of the basic human rights. Article 25 of the 1948 UN Declaration of Human Rights proclaims and renders it mandatory for the member countries that they should provide their citizens with adequate housing.

More importantly, the Constitution of Pakistan has also incorporated clauses dealing with the right to shelter and adequate housing to its citizens in line with the International commitments. Article 38 (D) makes the state responsible for providing basic necessities of life to the citizens such as food, clothing, housing, education and health irrespective of sex, caste, creed or race.

The CDA’s current plan to bulldoze the slums, load the residents into trucks and take them ‘back’ to their places of origin sounds despicable, illegal and morally inexcusable. Mass evictions are a remarkably old school policy when compared to current international standards and practices for dealing with urban slums. Present-day recommendations from international organizations, from the World Bank to the ADB and UN-HABITAT, strongly reject forced expulsion and discourage resettlement especially when it is done without the consent of slum dwellers.

In order to efficiently tackle the issues behind informal settlements and the necessity of providing such workers with a place to live, government must avoid forced eviction and instead plan a combination of regularization and slum upgrading, participatory resettlement and public housing projects. CDA should competently allocate a budget for the development of the recognized slums. If it has a reason to remove the “illegal slums , then it is the state’s responsibility to provide them with housing schemes on a minimal amount, preferably apartments saving the space, providing them with proper sanitation system, places of entertainment, health units etc.  

published in dailytimes on June 22, 2014