The Pune Municipal Corporation's (PMC) ongoing slum rehabilitation project at Yerawada would be showcased at an international exhibition at Smithsonians Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York.
The project was implemented under the basic services for the urban poor (BUSP) scheme of the Jawaharlal Nehru national urban renewal mission (JNNURM) by the civic body. The museum is organising an international exhibition, 'Design with the other 90% cities' from October 15 to January next year.
Well-known architect Prasanna Desai, who had planned the Yerawada project, will attend the event.
"The Yerawada project was an initiative by the Society for the Promotion of Area Resource Centres (Sparc), an NGO which works on slum development. Sparc also found immense support from Community Housing Federation (CHF) and Mahila Milan, an NGO in the city," Desai said.
Under the project, dwellings were provided to the families of 1,125 households residing in seven high-density slum areas in Yerawada. These include Mother Teresanagar, Sheela Salvenagar, Wadarwasti, Bhattnagar, Netajinagar, Yashwantnagar and Chandramanagar.
"We started working on the project in April 2009. There were many challenges we faced to carry out the project, including the funds. However, the biggest obstacle was to convince the slum people about the advantages of the project," Desai said.
He said each house in the project costs nearly Rs3 lakh and the project is to be completed by March 2012.
"Of the 1,125 houses under the project, 180 have been constructed, whereas 650 are still under construction," project engineer of the PMC, Dhananjay Sadalpure said.
The project is an effort to make Pune slum-free. "People living in these areas are deprived of many amenities. This project will provide them with these facilities," he said.
Member of the Mahila Milan, Sarita Sonawane, who resides in the slum, said the biggest problem that the slum dwellers face is lack of attached toilet.
"The project provides us with these amenities which will make life easy in slums," she said.Engineers discuss BUSP project in the slums of Yerawada.
