Besides building houses for people living in slums, SRS also focuses on supporting the communities, reports Dolly Mirchandani

Founded in 1972 by Adolf Tragler, an Austrian, Slum Rehabilitation Society (SRS) was the first NGO dedicated to slum rehabilitation in Mumbai. Over the years, it has built a considerable record of successfully converting slums into healthy communities.

SRS works with people who have lived in slums for over a decade because they cannot afford proper housing in the metropolis. It aims to provide slum-dwellers with a legal, self-contained home that has basic amenities like: a raised kitchen platform, a toilet and a bathroom. Having a home is only the beginning; so SRS involves itself with post-rehabilitation activities to ensure that slum-dwellers make a smooth transition to living in apartments. This involves help with understanding co-operative housing society rules, building maintenance and upkeep and taxes. Having done this, SRS also works at empowering women’s groups, building a network to provide pre-school education, income-generation projects, solid waste management, activities to beautify the environment and other services.

The Society initially focused on a section of Bandra (a Mumbai suburb), containing 30-odd slum pockets. Its first rehabilitation project at Mount Mary was completed in 1977. Until now, SRS has rehabilitated 7,000 families. Speaking about the new initiatives, Mr Tragler, the honorary  secretary says, “The Society is currently engaged in two assignments—one for safe and legal supply of electricity to Shivaji Nagar slum in Deonar; the other is a socio-economic survey of nearly 10,000 families living in slums in Sion Koliwada. In terms of housing slum-dwellers, we are working on two projects, one in Khar and the other in Andheri, comprising 260 families. In Andheri and Bandra, we are working on several slum rehabilitation projects. Our greatest handicap is inadequate financial capacity.”

SRS promotes a ‘self-development’ approach to rehabilitation in which slum-dwellers play an active role. They are mobilised to develop their own land so that no outsider or individual walks away with the profit and no individual can indulge in profiteering. The benefits then accrue to the dwellers as well as the city. “However, because of the free housing scheme, people do not contribute financially,” says  Mr Tragler. When asked about the challenges faced by the organisation, he says, “We are not in favour of the free housing scheme for slum-dwellers. This scheme has made people passive and demanding without any responsibility on their part. It also has pitted us against the powerful builder lobby who do not like to hear of self development and people having a say in their rehabilitation. Some builders try to intrude on our projects by offering money to the committee members, persuading them to join the builder and to bring the people also over to the builder.” He further adds, “A big problem is corruption in the committees of the slum-dwellers; and undue support from interested political parties or elected representatives adds to our problems.”

On funding and donations, Mr Tragler says, “We received Rs5.20 lakh from Alternaid, Germany, for medical services, while interest from fixed deposits is close to Rs2 lakh. We have received only Rs1.45 lakh this year from consultancy service. Our other amounts are overdue, particularly from Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority. Miscellaneous expenses till date are about Rs2.25 lakh. The amount received through funding is very poor. We mostly struggle to create some additional income from our consultancy. Donations in our case are very few.”

The welfare activities of SRS include running balwadis (kindergarten), creating self-help groups, mahila mandals and holding health camps. SRS also conducts events such as Children’s Day, dental camps, medical programmes, teacher training, anti-malaria programme, etc. Donations made to SRS are exempt under Section 80G of the Income-Tax Act.