The concept of housing is not confined to just a house or a building. An expensive and beautiful house does not necessarily satisfy our housing needs. The resilience of buildings against earthquake along with the level of satisfaction of housing related needs during and after the disaster really matters. No doubt we need a roof over our heads and whenever it rained, this need was greatly felt. However, after the recent earthquake, most of us might have sensed and gathered a different perspective on our need for housing. To fulfill our needs, shelter is required to primarily protect us from unpleasant climatic conditions such as rain, wind, extreme heat or cold. At the time of the earthquake, our primary concern had been whether we were safe or not; wondering what was the chance of us being rescued if we were trapped. The chance naturally depends on the availability of willing fellow human beings and their organizations to help and rescue others and an easy access to the place of accident. The house we once considered our safe abode no longer provided us a sense of security; instead it became a subject of concern.
Most of our basic survival needs are related with, if not integral parts of, housing. We need open space, on-site physical infrastructure and services such as evacuation routes, water, sanitation and health, energy for lighting and cooking and so on. In terms of their relative availability, we must have learnt after going through the unique experience of living through many earthquakes within a week that some of the challenges that we face in meeting our needs are due to our sophisticated living standards that the society as a whole cannot afford. We seem to have been using modern approaches that are not easy for us to maintain at the time of crisis. Despite hard work it took several days to replace basic infrastructure like electricity, telecommunication and water.
We also realized that there are threats due to unethical activities such as artificial scarcity of essential goods and services, black marketing, crime and theft, dissemination of false predictions of earthquake with the purpose of creating chaos and disorder. This impaired our sense of security all the more.
We could clearly see that resources required for meeting such housing needs are not well taken care of. Our common public open spaces are mostly dirty, water-logged and inhabitable. Water sources are not well maintained and clean. Streets are crammed with improper garbage disposal and access for escape is not easy. The complete destruction of Dharahara with a large number of casualties clearly showed that we grossly neglected the safety of our heritage sites. Such sites instead of providing risk mitigation services turned into areas of fear and resentment. Some wider roads were used for shelter and private cars parked on roadsides provided shelter for some. However they are primarily meant for vehicular traffic and are not used as public space or for shelter. Most spaces owned and managed by government agencies were not easily accessible. These led us to realize the lack of habitable open spaces where we can take refuge by constructing temporary shelter to sleep and to plan for carrying out relief works and providing basic needs. We realized that we should have minimized built-up space, leaving behind more open space for community use. We thus failed to plan and create built-up space for public purpose to meet our needs at the time of disaster. Common spaces whether open or built, proved to be more useful than the private ones. Community space facilitates the provision of services associated with housing.
Our experiences and learning, to my mind, drives us to the point that it will be easier to meet housing needs if the process of rebuilding is based on a holistic view of our needs. Rebuilding should mean not just to rebuild the house but the whole process of fulfilling our housing needs. Somehow we have misinterpreted our housing needs during the last few decades. We seem to have failed to realize that the primary function of housing is not wealth accumulation, property ownership or social prestige that disrupts coherence and harmony in society. The process of rebuilding implies a comprehensive approach that takes care of all the aspects of sustainable development directed to the revival of community resilience. The limited public space that we have ought to be used for rebuilding social cohesiveness. Help and relief activities in such times can be sustained only if the resources required for rebuilding can be replenished. Extensive use of otherwise available resources will create scarcity leading to price escalation. It is necessary to sustain their supply and recognize the increasing cost of production. Some goods and resources need to be rationed although this is likely to be increasingly difficult and inequitable in our case. We need to understand that scarcity of resources will lead to rise in price and if we try to control prices, supply will decline causing more inflation and scarcity. This implies that we should not leave any room for creating scarcity. We should manage for the required resources right at the beginning. If we cannot supply enough, we ought to lower our standards in order to avoid the risk of scarcity. Sustained supply of necessary goods and building materials is an important aspect; otherwise spending will just raise prices and the lack of necessary inputs will affect rebuilding. Sustainable use of scarce resources will help minimize spending and check the price level to a certain extent. Instead of grants, interest-free loans will be more effective for mobilizing families and the community in the process of rebuilding.
All with good intention should have the right and access to serve the people in distress. However the resilience of the community itself needs to be respected for coordinating the relief works. This is the best strategy for the State to choose between alternative avenues of providing basic services required at the time of disaster as well as for rebuilding after the disaster. External help should and can reach the neighborhood level and people at distress will unite themselves to live together by helping each other. Relief received from outside may not be adequate for sustaining the process of rebuilding. People, families and neighborhoods in post traumatic distress need to maintain love and compassion among themselves for their steady recuperation. Moreover, any external help would work as a connecting thread linking different communities that are trying to rebuild their resilience themselves. People who are willing to help will come forward if their help is being integrated with institution-driven assistance. This is possible when we allow neighborhoods to express what they need most. The process of rebuilding should take this into account.
Loss of human lives and other assets will be less if we lower our standards of living while meeting our real housing needs. This is not something new for us. We applied the norms set in Basic Housing Plan 1986 for the 1988 Earthquake Rehabilitation Program and it worked well. We need to appreciate this and not forget our dire realities despite our sudden exposure to globalization and modern lifestyles.