Involuntary Displacement and Resettlement — Policy and ... - CEPA

land with a small house. The house has neither electricity nor water. Sheis waiting for another grant to pay for this infrastructure. Mrs. Swarnadurai’ssituation is of consequence as it highlights the importance ofjointly-registering new houses. Datta (2006) in her study of joint titling inurban informal/ squatter settlements in India found that when housing unitswere regularised and joint titles given to both spouses, women felt that theyhad more control over household-level decision making (2006: 278-279);were given exposure to new arenas such as banking, the financialbureaucracy and local politicians (281); that their husbands would be lesslikely to abandon them as they maintained some control over the house(283); that they got more respect from their husbands or at least felt moreequal to them (287); and finally, they felt that they could take legal actionagainst a husband if he tried to sell the house unilaterally (289). While theexperience of women in squatter settlement in urban India is not exactly thesame as in Colombo, there are the parallels − a lack of control over assets,no access to collateral, indebtedness, and abandonment. While Datta admitsthat intra-household equality might have not been completely achieved withthis initiative and that husbands might harass or otherwise coerce their wivesto sign a deed in order to sell a house, her study provides some evidencethat women in poor urban communities can benefit from joint propertyownership.Women in Sri Lanka have the right to hold and dispose of property. A recentpublication points out, “each family unit has its own unique way of distributingfamily responsibilities and this should be taken into account” (COHRE 2006:3), which is why houses are sometimes written only in the wife’s name. OtherSri Lankan scholars have shown that women play such an important role inhousehold reproduction strategies that the idea that a man/husband is the‘sole authority’ in a household is a misnomer (Ruwanpura 2006; Kottegoda2004; Goonesekera 1990). Yet, it is standard administrative practice toconsider the man as the authority figure and subsequently deem him the‘head of household’ through which legal and financial goods and services arechannelled. Thus, his name is placed on the list or the title is written only inhis name. In order to secure more rights for women in general and for goodsand services in particular, ‘head of household’ as a concept needs to berejected. Yet, due to policy biases and the attitude of government officials thisrejection alone might not be enough.Sri Lanka’s house-to-house tsunami policy is complicated by the nature ofwhat constitutes a legal family. The house-to-house policy is not a house perfamily policy which is why some persons living in joint family situations188