I met with Manvita Baradi the Director of
the Urban Management Centre (UMC) and an architect to discuss the role of women
architects in India. She believes that Indian planning is very male dominated
with most city Commissioners being male. When public meetings are being held
the women are often encouraged to stay at home. Manvita undertook a detailed
heritage study for the city of Surat which was commissioned by one of the few
women commissioners. Manvita is currently working on a slum policy for the state
of Surat that will examine issues like tenure, health and social security. A
big problem in Ahmedabad is that slum renewal projects often relocate people
far from work opportunities.
Manvita believes that male planners tend
to produce very rigid layouts for slum resettlements. UMC is currently working
on 7 small cities in Madhya Pradesh which have tourist potential. The problem
has been to find accurate maps. For one city the only map the authorities could
find was dated 1835. UMC is also working on a village outside Mumbai with 11
temples and developing guidelines to ensure their character is protected.
No comments:
Post a Comment