Nagpur: A sports teacher in Nagpur has been giving hope to slum dwellers. Vijay Barse has given young runaways and former drug addicts a new identity by setting up slum soccer.
Shehnaz would have been burning the stove and her dreams, cooking a meal for her family, in her tiny house. Drugs and alcohol would have consumed Akhilesh Paul as a young kid. Homkant, who ran away from home and despair, would have been wandering the streets with no goal. Read more
Source : ibnlive.in.com
OneWorld South Asia
In an exclusive opinion piece, Rajesh Tandon, President, Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA) has appealed to the Union Government for improved and better implementation of policies and Centrally-sponsored schemes in its Budget 2012. He focuses on high inflation that is reducing the nutritional intake of the poor; improving the infrastructure of small and medium sized towns and cities; and problems faced by NGOs after amendments were made to Section 2(15) of the IT Act, 1961.
Persistently high inflation during the past year has caused severe hardships to many households which are living below or close to the poverty line. This issue was discussed in consultations last year. The pattern of food production is shifting in a manner that high nutrition, low cost food supply is stagnating or declining. The likely fall of production of pulses will further increase the risk of malnutrition in poor households. During the year, milk prices have increased nearly 50 per cent, further resulting in lower consumption of nutritional foods by poor households. Read more
Source : zeenews.india.com
Rather than portraying rapid urbanisation in terms of overconsumption, we should be celebrating it
Rapid urbanisation in Beijing and elsewhere has taken the number of city dwellers in China over 51% for the first time. Photograph: Dan Chung for the Guardian
In January, China marked a historic milestone in its development: for the first time ever, city dwellers outnumbered the rural population. According to the Chinese statistics bureau, 691 million people now live in cities, amounting to more than 51% of the population. Yet this fact merited just a single sentence in a Chinese government press release. Meanwhile, in the western media, to the extent that this genuinely historic event was covered, it sometimes seemed less a matter for celebration than trepidation.
Such a reaction says a lot about the way rapid urbanisation in the developing world is viewed. Over the next 20 years or so, the global urban population is expected to rise to approximately 5 billion. This explosion of urban life could be greeted enthusiastically, as a sign of progress and development – moving people off the land and out of back-breaking labour. But far too often, urbanisation is instead seen through the contemporary prism of social, political and ecological concerns: overpopulation, fears about the breakdown of traditional communities, and the dangers cities create for the broader environment, to name but a few. Read more
Source : guardian.co.uk
In a day, we will know which party or alliance will control the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), the body responsible for the running of the city of Mumbai. Rs 21,096.56 crore is what the BMC budgeted to spend in 2011-2012, and, considering the problems citizens of the metro face in the context of the responsibilities of the BMC, one wonders where the money has gone.
The mushrooming of illegal encroachments across the city needs to be a high focus for the winners of the high-stakes battle. Reuters
Here’s a look at the top concerns of Mumbaikars that the BMC needs to alleviate: Read more
Source : firstpost.com
Redeveloping slums can change the quality of life for the majority of metropolitan Indians living in slums
How to tackle the massive urban explosion India is and likely to continue experiencing in the foreseeable future? Two comprehensive reports have put a figure to the huge resources required to create capacity to meet the needs expected by 2030. The urban infrastructure report initiated by the ministry of urban development says Rs 39 lakh crore (around half of current GDP); the McKinsey Global Institute’s report, “India’s Urban Awakening”, says $1.2 trillion (Rs 60 lakh crore, around 80 per cent of current GDP).
One way to address this enormous resource crunch is to shrink costs — innovate, think different, find affordable solutions. Interestingly, one set of solutions lies away from the problem areas themselves — to tackle A, do something in B. The bigger the city, the more it costs to create the same capacity. So costs go down if we focus on smaller urban areas. More capacity in smaller cities with job potential will enable them to shoulder a larger share of the growing urban burden. Read more
Source : business-standard.com
In 2001, about 286 million persons were living in urban areas of India and it was the second largest urban population in the world. According to the Registrar General & Census Commissioner of India, the urban population in India over the next 25 years is expected to grow 38 per cent and become 534 million in 2026. Furthermore, as per the Census of India, 2001, 640 cities/towns in 26 States/Union territories have reported slum populations.
Andhra Pradesh has the largest number of towns (77) reporting slums followed by Uttar Pradesh (69), Tamil Nadu (63) and Maharashtra (61). As many as 42.6 million people lived in slums in 2001. This constitutes 15 percent of the total urban population of the country and 22.6 percent of the urban population of the states/union territories reporting slums. Read more
Source : economictimes.indiatimes.com
In order to make Chandigarh a slum-free city, the Chandigarh Administration has proposed to make it “mandatory for all private houses and industrial plots of one kanal and above, who engage servants or labour to make available suitable accommodation for them within their premises”.
A view of the slums at Colony No. 5 in Chandigarh
This has been stated by the Chandigarh Administration in its voluminous report submitted to the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The 177 page report was submitted to the High Court last week during the resumed hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking directions to Administration to prepare a master plan for the city. Read more
Source : indianexpress.com
What's on your plate? Photo: Special Arrangement
Giving healthy food to their children is a constant concern for parents no matter what social status they belong to. But not all parents are aware of what constitutes healthy nutritious food. The Human Development Report (2009) prepared by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) reported high rates of malnutrition among children in slums, and the urban elite. Malnutrition among slum children is not a surprise as they do not have access to nutritious food. This report highlighted the co-emergence of malnutrition and overnutrition where rich urban children eat excessive calorie rich but nutrient empty food (devoid of minerals and vitamins). Intake of palatably tasty but nutritiously poor fast foods, aerated drinks, foods high in trans fat, saturated fats and sugar (such as pizzas, burgers, sodas and colas, cakes and pastries, samosa, French fries) do not provide the necessary minerals and vitamins required for daily intake although they may provide the necessary calories. Obesity with micronutrient deficiency and protein energy malnutrition is on the rise among children and adolescents in urban India. Read more
Source : thehindu.com
New Delhi: Cities test your resilience. Surrender is oblivion. Courage is life.
The Economic Survey of Delhi 2007-2008 put the annual migrant influx into Delhi at 2.5 lakh. Almost an equal number is added by birth per year, says the survey. Reuters
It is courage which makes Shabnam, 49, carry on with her life at Lal Bagh area in East Delhi. Bulldozers have razed her shanty, thrice, in the last eight years. On all three occasions, she claims, the occupants of 200 odd slums were given two hours to evict. The first demolition taught her a lesson. She never made a pukka structure again. Her shanty, around five feet in height, is made of straw, tin, raxene and asbestos. Read more
Source : firstpost.com
NEW DELHI (AlertNet) - India's "unacceptably high" levels of child malnutrition are a "national shame", Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Tuesday, adding that almost half the children in the country were still under-weight despite two decades of rapid economic growth.
A malnourished child waits for food at the Nutritional Rehabilitation Centre in Sheopur district in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh April 6, 2010. REUTERS/Reinhard Krause
Despite doubling the size of its economy between 1990 and 2005, Asia's third-largest economy has not yet been able to wipe out the mass hunger which still haunts rural landscapes and lurks in the alley ways of urban slums. Read more
Source : trust.org
Chennai : A private hospital, a for-profit micro-finance company and an information technology company have joined forces to attempt what state and local governments have struggled to do for decades-bring quality,affordable medical treatment to India's hundreds of millions of poor people.
Apollo Hospitals,Equitas and HealthNet Global are setting up "telemedicine centers" in Equitas's 300 offices,mostly in urban slums,which will be staffed by nurses and stocked with medical testing equipment and a laptop with video conferencing. Read more
Source : ndtv.com
Recent Comments