Operational Mitigation – Transient Housing: The Case of Jammu, India

Abstract

Continual rains that led to intense flooding of the Jhelum River in Jammu during September 2014, affected a population of 1, 75,000 people over 19 districts. Urban poor and middle class families faced severe crisis in accessing basic amenities like communication, road access, hygiene and drinking water facilities. With the rising water level and lack of road transport, people were stranded on the rooftops. The main challenge of the project was the rehabilitation of the people considering lack of transportation facilities and resources needed for construction. The post disaster management project was an operational mitigation developed to address crucial aspects of urban life such as to provide permanent housing, restoring livelihoods, education and skill building to ‘build back better’, create better medical facilities and improve the scenario to resist the disasters in the future. In this case it is observed that the community participation and usage of available resources helped building temporary shelters in the aftermath of the disaster as part of rehabilitation measures taken. While the transient housing addressed the immediate needs of the victims, the need for permanent housing stands as the main concern.