Children's Workshops Continue in Sangli

Shelter Associates has been running a series of workshops for children in the slums of Sangli. They are targeted at 10 and 12 year-olds, whose families will soon be relocated under the Government of India's JNNURM scheme. The workshops take place in a fun and informal atmosphere, where the children have the chance to get to know their new neighbours and learn about their role as future caretakers of their environment.

Following a series of six introductory 'ice-breaking' workshops, there will be further sessions on Health & Nutrition, Water, and Sanitation & Waste.

Click on the picture to read the full story (pdf), and look out for our Children's Workshop video, coming soon to the Shelter Associates website.

Sanitation in Shivrai Nagar

Sanitation Projects are an important part of Shelter Associates' ongoing work in the city of Pune. Click on the picture below to read about one such project in the community of Shivrai Nagar, where more than 100 individual toilets have been constructed over the last five months.

Although Shelter Associates were initially invited into the community to provide toilets, it quickly became apparent that this just was one of a number of issues facing the residents of this settlement. Working together with local people, Non-Governmental Organizations and the Municipal Corporation of Pune, Shelter Associates were also able to help residents of Shivrai Nagar with sewerage and waste collection.

Following the success of work in Shivrai Nagar community workers from Shelter Associates have begun surveying neighbouring communities, where residents are keen to start similar sanitation projects.

Click on the picture to read the full story (pdf).

Workshop for Community Children of Sangli

In collaboration with NiBo, Shelter Associates conducted a two-day workshop for children on August 21st and August 22nd.  The workshop covered 8 slums in the cities of Sangli, Miraj, Kupwad (all three of which form a municipal corporation). 80 children between the ages of 10 and 12 participated.

This workshop is the first in a series that is being planned for the slum kids of Sangli and the surrounding areas who are part of the IHSDP (Integrated Housing and Slum Development Programme) portion of the JNNURM (Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission) program of the Government of India. There are 29 slums covering almost 3800 families that will be relocated as part of this project.

Shelter Associates believes that these children are the future caretakers of their new environment. Any efforts made at this tender and impressionable age to teach them about environmental issues will help in building a sense of responsibility towards the upkeep of their new homes and environment. The workshops aim to impart learning through fun and games in an informal atmosphere. The themes will tackle health and hygiene and other environmental related issues. Each group will be taken through 6 workshops over the next 5 months.

For more information, please read our flyer on children's workshops (pdf).

Model House Exhibition

On 2nd May, a model house exhibition was held at Indira Nagar slum in Sangli. The aim of the exhibition was to illustrate the approved ISHDP scheme to the slum community and to give them an opportunity to experience 1:1 spaces within their tenements before they get built. A gallery of panels were displayed leading to the model house that demonstrated the community mobilisation efforts of Shelter Associates over the last decade in various slums of the Sangli-Miraj-Kupwad Municipal Corporation. The exhibits also showed SA’s efforts over the last year in raising awareness about the IHSDP project not only in slum communities but also the general citizenry. On this page you can find the panels that were exhibited on the day as well as a short film illustrating the construction of the model house on site at Indira Nagar. The aim was to allow the community to begin to experience their future homes at a scale that was meaningful to them. Over three hardworking days, Shelter’s team worked alongside members of the community to construct a 1:1 bamboo replica of a single apartment.