Weekend-5-16

Issue | shelter for the homeless
Rain-soaked, sleepless nights
How do the homeless sleep in the rain?
Saqib Sarker
In the past few weeks, Dhaka and the entire
country has experienced heavy rainfall. The
landslide in the hilly areas claimed lives and
damaged properties. Dhaka’s waterlogging
problem once again rendered the city even
more motionless than it usually is from
constant gridlock. While everyone suffered
in one way or another, the most devastating
effect must have been on those who do not
have a roof over their heads. In an already
crisis-ridden city like Dhaka, the situation
is immensely exacerbated when there is a
spell of incessant rain for four or five days,
sometimes longer.
The homeless are ever-present in Dhaka.
They are so common that you hardly notice
them. But where do they go when torrential
rain and thunderstorms make people shut
their windows extra tight? How do they
sleep in relentless rain that literally doesn’t
stop for days, as we have experienced in the
past few weeks?
When all you can do is
endure
Dilu lives on the footpath adjacent to the
Taqwa mosque at Dhanmondi 12/A. A young
woman in her 20s, Dilu is quite indifferent
to the problem, appearing to find the
question of where she sleeps when it rains
quite pointless. “You have to find shelter
somewhere,” she says simply. She refuses
to be specific about where exactly she goes.
“Do you find shelter on shopping mall stairs,
late at night?” Dilu laughs and nods, thinking
it’s a silly question. “Listen, sir,” she said,
“you can write all you want in the newspaper
but no one will give us a home.”
In an elaborate and methodical study
by Research and Evaluation Division
Photo: Mahmud Hossain Opu
(RED) of BRAC, published in March 2011,
the researchers found 36 percent of the
homeless live on footpaths, 14 percent at
rail stations and 13 percent in stadiums,
and move to places having some kind of
cover during the rainy season. The survey
interviews a total of 2,264 street dwellers
from 20 spots in Dhaka city.
“Don’t take pictures,” said Khayrul, Dilu’s
disapproving brother. Khayrul works as a
labourer during the day, six days a week.
He shares that they just have to resort to
polythene sheets and they actually don’t
always find shelter. Even the little spaces
underneath shopping mall shades are too
difficult to come by sometimes. They also
don’t want to leave the place they usually
sleep in. In retrospect, it seems that they may
have found it undignified to admit that they
just clench their teeth and endure the rain.
The RED study found that sleeping on
footpaths on rainy days actually increased
with time among the group that are living in
the streets for more than one year and less
than five years. “In contrast to conventional
wisdom (that what this population needs
most is provision of water and sanitation),
shelter (especially during rain and storms)
and security were found to be the two main
concerns of the street dwellers,” the RED
study read.
From the sample studied in the survey,
during the rainy days 24.6 percent of the
street dwellers slept on footpaths, 15.7
percent in stadiums, 14.8 percent in bazaars,
13.1 percent at railway stations, 11 percent
in slums, 9.1 percent in launch terminals,
4.1 percent at bus stands and 7.7 percent of
the respondents found other miscellaneous
shelters.
No shelter, no sleep
Slightly further away from Dilu and Khayrul,
on the North side of the Dhanmondi 32
bridge, sat Mokhtar Shah, where he begs
during the day and sleeps at night. Aged
over 60 and with a filariasis affected leg,
Mokhtar is more or less immobile. He came
to Dhaka from Nilphamari quite recently.
When asked where he goes during the rain,
he pointed to the other side of the road
where there are dense trees sheltering the
sidewalk, but that is not nearly enough as
protection. When asked how he sleeps, the
elderly man simply said, “No sleep.”
Mokhtar Shah had difficulties speaking
full sentences and sounded exhausted when
he spoke. “I find shelter in buildings too,” he
said. When asked if he gets thrown out from
building premises, he merely stared, unable
to explain his methods.
Mokhtar Shah sitting at his ususal spot
Photo: Saqib Sarker
Like Mokhtar, Dilu and Khayrul, there
are thousands of people in Dhaka who
live without a roof over their heads.
Different studies find different numbers -
one study found the number of footpath
dwellers to be at 15 to 20 thousand, but
these figures are inconclusive because of
a lack of proper, exhaustive studies. The
situation is further complicated by constant
migration into the capital. According to one
estimate, approximately 320,000 migrants
enter Dhaka annually. The RED study
recommended a comprehensive census and
a number of short-term interventions, but
what should clearly take precedence above
all else is providing some form of shelter
where the homeless can stay in the most
turbulent weather. •
16 WEEKEND TRIBUNE | FRIDAY, AUGUST 11, 2017