Rebuilding Gujarat

Dr. Ranjit Singh

The earthquake which struck Gujarat at 8.46 am on 26 January 2001 is said to be the worst earthquake in the history of independent India. Recent carnage made it difficult to procure response from the relevant agencies as regards the actual progress on the ground.

Important feature of the rebuilding exercise was that alongwith state entities like HUDCO, nearly 230 Indian and foreign NGOs silently lent their hands in the hour of need.

The killer earthquake measuring 6.9 on the Richter scale lasted for 90 seconds. Its epicentre lay about 20km north-east of Bhuj, in Gujarat’s Kutch district. Over 30,000 people were killed, and 167,000 injured. Nearly 8,000 villages were affected in 21 districts.

Official figures state that 378,286 houses were completely destroyed, and 968,879 partially destroyed. Approximately 95 per cent of all standing structures in the Anjar, Bachau and Rapar blocks of Kutch were razed to the ground. More than 20,000 cattle were reported killed. Estimates of the economic damage range from $1.3 billion to as high as $5bn.

Gujarat government floated tax free bonds to raise funds for earthquake reconstruction requirements. NHB & HUDCO set aside funds for reconstruction of Gujarat and to issue tax-free bonds to the tune of Rs.2,000 crore. No customs duty and central excise levied for relief goods in Gujarat.

Coordination during any relief response plays a crucial role in ensuring that it is effective. A genuine effort was made to coordinate the numerous NGOs in Gujarat, both among themselves, and with the government, which provided information regarding the size and population of villages. In order to avoid duplication, relief organisations exchanged infor-mation among themselves regarding items being distributed and areas of coverage. The leading role in the coordination effort was taken up by Kutch Navnirman Abhiyan, a grouping of 14 NGOs that first came together during the 1998 cyclone.

Within hours, BAPS was directly involved in rescue, relief and rehabilitation. Initially rescuing survivors, BAPS volunteers cremated hundreds of bodies of the unfortunate victims. Through a team of 60 sadhus and 450 volunteers on site and a support team of 6500 volunteers, relief camps were set up which provided food and shelter along with socio-psycho-spiritual rehabilitation. BAPS distributed clothes, utensils, and essential relief supplies to the affected people in more than 409 remote villages.

But why is the bank not giving them their money? The villagers know that too. "The money is there in the bank, but we have been told that there are shortage of people to disburse it," Ahir said.

Eventually it was revealed that the concerned branch of the Kutch Grameen Bank, responsible for disbursing the house reconstruction grants, has a staff strength of only two while it has to disburse funds to more than 4,000 account holders spread across 16 villages.

The money has been transferred to these accounts directly from the Treasury to avoid harassment of these hapless villagers by Government officials disbursing the cheques, but the bank is unable to actually reach the funds to the ultimate beneficiary in time.

As a result, the rehabilitation process fails to function smoothly and despite availability of funds, house construction work is suffering in various places.

In this particular village, some 20 km off the almost destroyed town of Bhuj, villagers have received the first installment of the housing grant from the Government with which they started work. But because of manpower problem in the bank, the work has been halted after the first week of January. The picture, however, is not the same everywhere. There are some for whom the post-earthquake period is not all that bad.

One of them is Babu Hira of Jainabad village in the neighbouring Surendranagar district. A daily labourer by profession, his only son was born at 2 pm on the dreadful day of January 26, 2001, just five hours after the earthquake.

Today the baby is active and healthy, staying at his maternal grandparents’ house, while Hira is busy rebuilding his earthquake-resistant house with brick and mortar. Earlier, he lived in a small hutment at the village borders.

"I hope to complete the house in another month’s time after which I may bring the baby and the mother,’’ he said.

According to M. Sahu, Additional Chief Executive Officer of the newly set up Gujarat State Disaster Management Authority, till now approximately eight lakh houses have been restored or reconstructed out of the targeted 15 lakh. "The Government has launched a massive training programme to train the masons who are being sent to the villages to impart training to the villagers locally."

He said that there were many complaints as many people felt deprived but in most cases these had been found to be complicated family issues, which resulted in more than one person demanding the compensation for damaged buildings.

To sort out these problems, the District Judges have been appointed as Ombudsman with a three-tier grievance redressal mechanism. "This new system is working well. A total of around 39,000 complaints were received till December 31, 2001, of which 36,000 cases have been disposed of,’’ he said, and added that roughly 10 to 12 per cent of the complaints were found valid and accordingly, steps had been initiated to rectify the mistakes.

Government of Gujarat has launched a massive reconstruction and rehabilitation programme to reconstruct the houses and infrastructure. In order to enable people to reconstruct their houses, Government of Gujarat declared five rehabilitation packages earlier for all affected areas other than the four municipal towns of Anjar, Bhuj, Rapar and Bhachau. The nature and extent of damage in these four towns need a special package which will address various issues like relocation, In Situ reconstruction, town planning and infrastructure, striking a fine balance between the needs and wants of those affected.

For repairing and strengthening of RCC frame structure multi-storeyed buildings (Low Rise* & High Rise*), the scale of assistance was as per the categorisation of damage caused to the buildings done on the scale of ‘G to G5’. The owner occupants of collapsed buildings were eligible for loan as per Reserve Bank guidelines for earthquake-affected people.

A policy was evolved involving people in a participatory manner, evaluating the different views of various sectors of the affected population, keeping in view international experience and applying it to the present context. Government finalized a package for the municipal towns of Bhuj, Anjar, Bhachau and Rapar.

Area Development Authority in towns were created for a systematic and coordinated approach to reconstruction of the earthquake ravaged towns. These authorities would continue for a temporary period of 3-5 years, for the purpose of implementation of overall reconstruction on the basis of Town Development Plan being prepared
for each town.

Real challenge is this unholy nexus……

A serious charge levelled by several organisations and individuals in Kutch and other places is the alleged nexus between government officials and the builders’ lobby.

If several builders and contractors were really responsible for raising unauthorised apartment complexes in congested areas in flagrant violation of the by-laws, why are they not being punished in accordance with the law even after one year of the earthquake? Is there no way to break the nexus between the officials, builders and contractors? And is there no deterrent to check the haphazard growth of buildings?

The government’s lackadaisical attitude in this regard reinforces the belief that the rich and the mighty are beyond the long arms of law. What is more, the government has done little to put in place a code of conduct for builders. Such a code seems to have become necessary to fix accountability on recalcitrant builders and contractors.

It is also alleged that there has been rampant discrimination in relief and rehabilitation work in the affected areas. While some rich people have managed to get four to five houses, the really deserving ones have to contend with just a tarpaulin. There is no reliable data on the criteria for house allotment and the background and income levels of the actual beneficiaries. This makes one believe the reports of official bungling in loan sanction and house allotment.

Official insistence on residence proof (before last year’s earthquake), for the sanction of loans and/or shelter has left many victims high and dry as they have nothing left to show. In Rapar and Anjar, for instance, some people have not paid panchayat tax, having lived for decades on unauthorised village land. The state government maintains that District Judges, as ombudsmen, are looking into individual complaints. The National Human Rights

Commission is also seized of the matter. But justice is a long drawn out process and victims do not know how long they have to wait for a roof over their head. Surprisingly, in 61 villages of Kutch, the debris is yet to be removed and the work is yet to start.

The first phase corresponded to the preparation of the draft development plan for the four towns of Anjar, Bhuj, Bhachau and Rapar by the Town Planning Department of Gujarat with the assistance of consultants, selected on the basis of competitive bidding in conformity with the requirement of multilateral donor agencies. The second phase contemplated the design & supervision for rehabilitation & reconstruction of urban infrastructure with the support of consultants.

Property Tax and other taxes were suspended of for a year.

Participatory decision making resorted to involving community in the implementation. NGOs and other voluntary Agencies were involved together with Corporate houses in providing private houses and public infrastructure.

The owners of houses which fully collapsed/to be pulled down in the inner Town had the option for relocation. The houses, which obstructed proper town planning and did not conform to development regulations, were relocated.

The multi-storied buildings outside the inner town reconstructed in accordance with the approved plan lost FSI because of development regulations. Therefore some of the affected families who could not have their flats reconstructed were relocated and given plots.

The existing Jail, Police line and other adjacent public buildings were relocated.

The families relocated were given land in the nearby areas such as areas in the northern part near police line, Rawalwadi area, Mirzapur area, etc.

The beneficiaries holding less than 100 Sq.m. of land were offered 100 Sq. m. and those holding more than 100 sq. m. and also flat owners were offered 125 Sq.m. The beneficiaries whose landholding was more than 125 sq.m. had an option to buy additional 25 Sq.m. of land depending upon the availability.

Cost of the land allotted to the beneficiary was the cost of the land as per the existing Jantri plus the development charge at the rate of Rs.300 per Sq.m. If the cost of the land surrendered by the beneficiary was more, the difference was paid on surrender of land.

HUDCO rises to the occasion

HUDCO responded spontaneously to reach out with its techno-financial assistance to the victims of the natural calamity.

HUDCO extended a financial assistance of upto Rs 1500 crores for the earthquake rehabilitation programme for reconstruction, retrofitting and rehabilitation of housing and the damaged infrastructure (water supply through the Saurashtra Pipeline project benefiting affected districts in Saurashtra and Kutch regions) including the community asset buildings in the earthquake affected areas.

HUDCO raised this amount in the form of tax-free bonds as part of the HUDCO-Gujarat Punarnirman Tax Free Bonds to be used for the rehabilitation programme. The Union Government accorded approval for raising this amount through Tax Free Bonds in the Union Budget 2001-2002.

With its corporate contribution of Rs 2 crores for the earthquake rehabilitation programme, and dovetailing with the State Governments sharing programme, HUDCO took up provision of 3000 shelters including community asset buildings at Rapar.

HUDCO put up Earthquake Resistant Demonstration units for housing and community infrastructure in about 50 locations with its R&D Grant.

Technology assistance brochures on disaster resistant construction/ repairs/ retrofitting in the pattern of Do’s and Don’ts in Gujarati and English prepared and extensively distributed in the disaster affected areas.

In close collaboration with the State Government and the agencies like Gujarat Housing Board, Gujarat Rural Housing Board, District Rural development Agency and the NGOs, HUDCO would establish 31 Building Centres as technology transfer centres with financial and technical assistance coming from MOUDPA, MORD, HUDCO and BMTPC.

HUDCO extended assistance in the Renovation and restoration of historically significant sites/buildings in Bhuj, Ahmedabad and Rapar.

HUDCO established its Field Project Management Offices at Bhuj and Rapar.

A major comprehensive Action Plan entailing rapid assessment of the extent of damages to houses and buildings, financial assistance, dissemination of appropriate technology, establishment of building and community centres to demonstrate the use of disaster resistant housing including earthquake resistant technologies, adoption of villages and bastis for comprehensive development and setting up of HUDCO offices in Bhuj and Anjar was drawn up to provide techno-financial assistance for a massive rehabilitation and reconstruction programme for the earthquake ravaged areas of Gujarat.

As part of the Action Plan, HUDCO and BMTPC in collaboration with the State Governments carried out, in the shortest possible time, a rapid assessment of the extent of damages both qualitatively and quantitatively for reconstruction of fully damaged houses, repairs and renewal of partially damaged houses and retrofitting of existing vulnerable stock.

Based on the overall assessment, the programme for reconstruction of houses for various income categories in rural, semi-urban and urban areas as well as for redevelopment of infrastructure such as damaged roads and water supply, toilets and other civic amenities, was decided by the State Government and financial assistance provided by HUDCO.

The financial assistance from HUDCO was backed up with an appropriate technology package needed for re-building earthquake resistant houses, using local building materials like mud, stone, bricks, concrete etc. and this will be widely disseminated through use of instructive guidelines in the form of simple and user friendly Do’s and Don’ts.

Further, with a view to propagate earthquake resistant technologies in the cities and towns and villages, HUDCO and BMTPC extended support for the establishment of 30 Building Centres, construct demonstration houses and community buildings in all the disaster affected districts for technology transfer, training of local artisans, production of building materials and components, construction assistance and for guidance and information of the people.

HUDCO also adopted a few model villages and bastis for comprehensive development of fully damaged villages and bastis. In addition, HUDCO immediately set up its Field Project Management offices in Bhuj and Anjar, the worst affected areas.