The Information Needs of Homeless People: A Study on the Role of Public Libraries in Kolkata (original) (raw)
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Indian Journal of Spatial Science EISSN: 2249 - 4316 ISSN: 2249 - 3921 journal homepage: www.indiansss.org, 2013
Personswhodo not live in buildings or census houses but live in the open on the road side, on pavements, in large sewage pipes, under flyovers, at places of worship, on railway platforms are referred to as 'homeless' (Census of India, 2001). They constitute a significant proportion of a city's population and are steadily growing in number creating a serious imbalance in the functions and morphology of a city. They lead a very poor life with in fact no possessions. Often, the homelessness is caused by multiple and interrelated physical, social, economic, political and environmental factors. On this backdrop, the present study endeavours to explore the socio-economic conditions of homeless population living in the central part of Kolkata.
2017
Social problems are inevitable in urban communities. One of the problems is homeless. In Indonesia there is a foundation that provides shelter house for homeless, named Yayasan Bina Insan Mandiri (BIM). This shelter provides some books which functions as a simple library which provides reading materials for those who living in this shelter. While, in Malaysia there is a school for homeless and books are provided there too. In this article, the writer will get some data from a shelter house named Master (served by BIM) in Jakarta, Indonesia and data from a school for homeless in Malaysia. The writers will evaluate how this shelter and school operate the libraries provided there, what the benefits for the homeless and poor people and what the role of government in intervening this practice. In Indonesia, there is a governnment regulation no. 39 year 2012 about social welfare operation. The regulation mandated the implementation of social rehabilitation. Social rehabilitation is intend...
The Homeless People of Kolkata
The growing problem of homeless people in India is becoming worse by the day; and, in the big cities (the Municipal / Metropolitan authorities) are facing this as one of the main up-coming problems. Every big Indian city’s population can be divided according to their residence in 3 major residential areas / types of habitations: planned / Government approved houses and housing complexes, authorized / unauthorized slums and, makeshift shanty-dwellers and homeless people. Like all the major metropolitan cities of India Kolkata also has its own share of homeless people living in very difficult situations. As part of the SHELTER project in association with Indo-Global Social Service Society (IGSSS), a study was conducted by Sabuj Sanghain , to assess the present situation of the homeless people of Kolkata.
Food, clothing and shelter are the basic human needs. However, there are many who barely manage to acquire the first two necessities but the third remains beyond their reach. A large section of the population therefore lives and sleeps at public places, like roads, pavements and streets, and is categorized as the ‘homeless population’. Thus ‘homelessness’ can be defined as a condition of people lacking housing, because they cannot afford or are unable to maintain a regular, safe and adequate shelter. Homelessness is a growing phenomenon worldwide and also in India. Though both urban and rural areas have significant share of homeless population, it is found that, the decadal growth rate of homeless population has declined by 28.4 per cent in rural areas during 2001-2011 but the same has increased by 20.5 per cent in urban areas. In fact, in India, big cities are also capitals of homeless population. This paper attempts to analyze state and sector (rural-urban) wise distribution of homeless population in India and discuss the major initiatives taken by the government and other concerned authorities to tackle homelessness.
Issues of Homeless People-A case of Surat City
2016
India is now being recognized in world for development in the fields, of Economic, Business, Science and Technology. However even the developed countries have failed to provide to ever citizen India obliviously is not an exception. The homeless people have to live on the roadsides, pavements, drainage pipes, under staircases or in the open Temple Mandap, Platforms, Bus Stand, and Railway Station and so on. Mostly they are harassed and abused by the people, police and government authorities etc. at the shelter place, is a very miserable condition for them. Besides homeless people are excluded from the mainstream development of the country. They are not having proper employment i.e. economic security, resulting begging, poor health, and illiteracy. The issues of women and children are also very serious in the situation of homelessness. In case of women, they are suffering more than male; sometimes they become victim of rape, harassment, sexual harassment, murder etc. at the shelter place. The youngster being worst hit, some of them being habitual of addicted of Alcohol, Drugs, Gutaka etc. sometimes they are doing crime also i.e. rape, murder, smuggling, robbery etc. homeless people are passing their day and nights on the foot path and other public place i.e. garden, bus stand, railway station, market etc. during the all seasons i.e. summer, monsoon and cold winter. During the monsoon they are suffering from lot of problems i.e. flood, mud water, unclean area etc. at that time very difficult to them for living on footpath. During the winter, cold wave grips them and at that time some of the persons died due to cold wave. According to times of India during the cold wave in the Gujarat three people died in the winter on Feb. 2012. Sometimes they are not proved themselves as an Indian because they haven"t any ID proofs i.e. voter card, pan card, license etc. During the election they can"t use their right of vote. Thus homeless people are facing several challenges in their life against the natural disaster and human made disaster in the society. In this concern the study tries to shed light on the issues of homeless people. Different types of homeless people are found in the society i.e. migrated, a person from marginalization group, bagger, mentally retarded, victim of serious health disease, victim of communal riots, poor, street children etc. homeless people are characterized by poverty and mostly they are much poorer and has a lower echelons (level) status in the society because it"s renders them insecure and vulnerable to threats and violence. Many homeless people are living with households at the footpath place and there are also many children and youth found as a homeless, among them number of such "throw-away" and "run away" from the family in the villages, behind it main responsible factor is related to family strife, resulting changes are find in the family structure. More of homeless People are living with physical and mental illness and they are over-represented in the homeless population. Moreover ethnic minorities and migrants are also represented in the homeless population. Its fact that majority of the homeless people run away from the rural villages in search of employment, so homeless population is much increasing in the society through them. According to United Nation minimum conditions for a person to be countable as homeless ;(Homelessness: from Wikipedia the free Encyclopedia) 1. The person is assumed not to own any other property that is habitable in or on 2. Their rent or mortgage are equal to or greater than 72% of their monthly income 3. Their source of income to pay rent is not stable or the amount of money available for food is not stable. The census of India uses the notion of house who are not living in "census house", the latter referring to a structure with roof, home the enumerators are instructed, "to take note of the possible places where the houseless population is likely to live such as on the roadside, pavements in home pipes, under staircase or in the open temple. Available statistics reflect the strength of homeless people in the state and nation. According to United Nations documents, there are about 100 million homeless persons in the world. The highest rates of homeless people in Western Europe are found in Germany, France, and the United Kingdom; whereas 4 and 12 per thousand of the population is estimated to be homeless. A much large number of people have little or no money with the population of India growing by lips and bounds, many more people are born in to a life of poverty in every year. In India, 1981 estimated 2,343,000 people were homeless while in 1991 18.5 million homeless people in India. As per 2001 census 1.94 million homeless people in India among them 1.16 million lived in villages and 0.77 million lived in cities and towns. In Delhi which was having 3.1 percent of the national level while Bihar and Tamilnadu having 1.6 percent, 7.3 percent respectively and 73.75 percent in Chennai. Surat had the highest number of homeless people in the state of Gujarat, whereas 23,000 of homeless people in 2010 while preliminary findings of the census 2011 indicate that this has risen to nearly 40000 and 10,000 homeless people in Ahmadabad in 2011
Homeless People in West Bengal: A District Level Study
Space and Culture, India, 2018
The phenomenon of homelessness has often been explained as an obvious result of rapid urbanisation along with the limited housing facility in the urban areas (the destination region), but undoubtedly, it is interlinked with multifaceted issues which have been deeply rooted in the socioeconomic and political set up of the rural areas and small towns (the source region). Rural-urban development disparity, rural-urban migration, poverty, intra-regional unequal human development and housing shortage are some of the factors that have intensified the problem of pavement dwelling in urban areas. According to the Census of India (2011), the state of West Bengal holds the 7th position among the states of India with 134040 homeless people. The development disparity between Kolkata and other parts of the state has resulted a definite district-wise spatial distributional pattern of homeless people with the greatest concentration in Kolkata city. The study attempts to probe into the spatio-temporal distribution of homeless population and strives to ascertain the instrumental factors of the phenomenon in a contextual framework with the help of available and acquired data and information. Simple statistical methods- location quotient, Z-score, bi-variate correlation, Sphereman’s Rank Correlation Coefficient and Student t test have been used for the analysis. The findings suggest that the less developed districts, as well as the states, surrounded the Kolkata act as the source region that has pushed the destitute community towards the city and compelled them to reside on the footpaths of the city without a roof.
An Analysis of Socio Economic Conditions of Homeless People’s in Madurai City, Tamil Nadu
Shanlax International Journal of Economics, 2019
Homeless people who not able to get and keep regular, safe and sound houses, or lack of fixed usual and sufficient night-time residence. The numbers of homeless peoples are increased due to the lack of adequate housing, unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood and old age etc. They are living in open areas like pavements, railway platforms, Hume pipes, under flyovers and open places near temples are described as homeless. In India, 1.77 million people are living homeless and 35 per cent of people are still earning $1 or less a day. The objectives of the study are 1) to know the socio-economic conditions of the homeless people in Madurai city, 2) to examine the factors affecting the homeless people in Madurai city and 3) To suggest viable strategies for improving their living conditions of homeless people. The study is entirely based on primary data. It deals with socio-economic conditions of homeless people, and factors influencing homelessness of homeless people in Madurai cit...
The homeless and information need and services
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The overarching goal of this article is to sensitize the insensitive governments, institutions , and civil societies for homeless population in social sphere. Routes into home-lessness are complex, multiple and interlinked. The complex triggers consist of biographical, structural and behavioural factors, when combined, increase people's vulnerability to homelessness. Despite the high economic growth and double digit GDP growth that gives opportunity to celebrate the country's achievement, the worsening condition of the homeless, underlaid by huge inequality, creates the huge contradiction for such celebrations. The problems and complexity associated with homelessness require several stages of prevention, intervention and system-based response for a solution. Thus, policy response requires the urgent need to move away from discussions on general welfare policies to context-specific policies; otherwise, the aspirations of sustainable development will be castles in the air.