Slum as ‘place’: transformation, adaptation and place-making of domestic and community living of Ershadnagar resettlement

Abstract

This paper investigates the transformation process of a peri-urban slum – ‘Ershadnagar Resettlement Camp’ where forty two years ago; the inner city’s evicted homeless population was relocated without any proper proposition. It discusses how the slum has gained the attributes of a ‘place’ through the transformation and adaptation process of ‘place making’ where both the informal struggles of people and formal organizational initiatives are equally valid. This approach tends to highlight facts regarding the sociocultural complexity of slums rather that statistical data. Dhaka- the capital of Bangladesh and most densely populated city of the world is facing an extreme pressure to accommodate its ever increasing number of slum dwellers. The study area is located at Tongi, a peri-urban location at the north of Dhaka. This almost 100 acre camp was a government initiative to house the evicted illegal slum dwellers as a part of ‘Dhaka Clean’ project in 1974. Since then, with discrete help from government and non government organizations, the camp dwellers have gradually developed themselves into a community. From field survey, interviews of inhabitants and development workers and discretely available secondary data the place making process have been analyzed at both community and household level. While catalyzing factors in the process of ‘place making’ is observed, the lack of tenure has been identified as a negative catalyst.