IHSDP, Sangli

The IHSDP scheme (Integrated Housing and Slum Development Programmes) has been introduced by the Government of India for the purpose of slum improvement in cities and towns under the JNNURM (Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission). The critical objective of the IHSDP scheme is to strive for holistic slum development with a healthy and enabling urban environment by providing adequate shelter and basic infrastructure facilities to the slum dwellers of the identified urban areas.

Sangli-Miraj-Kupwad is a small municipal corporation in the state of Maharashtra about 400 kms south of Mumbai on the banks of the river Krishna and covers an area of 118 sq.kms. The population of this city was close to 5 lakhs according to the census of 2001. The city of Sangli appointed Shelter as a consultant to submit a proposal to the Government of India (GOI) in February 2009 under the IHSDP scheme for the rehabilitation of almost half Sangli's slum population, covering 29 slums across the city, into an integrated housing and infrastructure scheme. The unique feature of this proposal was its citywide perspective for slum improvement and development using remote sensing technology and GIS software. 22 slums must be relocated, as they were either along roads that were to be widened or had other reservations on them. Shelter was able to plan out their relocation to neighboring sites within 2-2.5 kms of their existing place of occupation. This planned approach, with great consideration for 'origins and destinations' of the slums to be relocated, ensured that the communities were not far removed from their current places of work or other social amenities like schools, markets, etc. Seven of the identified sites owned by the SMKMC (Sangli-Miraj-Kupwad Municipal Corporation) already have slums on them. Shelter designed 'walk-up' social housing, which would rehabilitate the existing dwellers on the site as well as create an extra housing stock that could absorb the neighboring slums that had to be relocated. The GOI approved this project as a special case for its innovative, holistic and inclusive citywide approach using technology that could potentially be replicable in other cities' attempts to be 'slum free'.