Havens for the helpless
Families left homeless by the cloudburst that devastated Himachal Pradesh in 2023 now have a roof over their heads — thanks to innovative and reusable disaster shelters
On August 14, 2023, Himachal Pradesh was battered by a cloudburst unprecedented in scale. The floods and landslides triggered by the calamitous event claimed 72 lives across the state and left thousands bereft of their homes and livelihoods. Among the affected were Room Prakash and his family, residents of Saraugi village in Mandi district, who lost their home and belongings to the devastation.
With his modest land holding in disarray, Mr Prakash’s livelihood was in ruins and his future uncertain. The immediate challenge for the family, though, was finding a roof over their heads. For two months, they took shelter in a cattle shed belonging to a relative in a nearby village. Then they moved into a makeshift dwelling. Mr Prakash needed help, and urgently so.
That would materialise in November 2023, when Mr Prakash and his family became part of a programme that was developed to provide temporary shelters to people hit by disasters. The programme was conceived and executed through a collaboration between the Tata Trusts and People’s Science Institute (PSI), a nonprofit based in Dehradun in Uttarakhand.
Before winter set in, the Prakash family moved into a disaster shelter that they could use as a temporary home. It not only gave comfort and dignity to the family but also enabled them to get their lives back on track. “This shelter has been our home since then and we are grateful to the Tata Trusts and PSI for helping us,” says Mr Prakash.
The requirement for such shelters arises from how India handles disaster rehabilitation. While the government steps in to offer funding, the time taken for a family to rebuild their home can extend to years. Meanwhile, the rise in extreme weather events means that the demand for such shelters is increasing all the time.
The Trusts’ solution addresses several aspects of the problem. Somewhat like a portable cabin, the temporary shelter can be fabricated locally and dismantled, stored and reassembled quickly whenever needed. The design is based on a template that can be replicated, and comes with a process manual carrying instructions for assembly.
“The modular shelters demonstrate immense potential for scaling, particularly in the context of a disaster,” explains Shikha Srivastava, head of urban poverty alleviation at the Tata Trusts. “By integrating them with housing schemes and urban resilience projects, they can bridge the gap between emergency relief and long-term recovery, offering a replicable model for other regions.”
Collaborative effort
To make it work, PSI collaborated with the Trusts, local NGOs, architects, gram panchayats (village councils) and district disaster management agencies. By the end of the project, 60 shelters — each having a habitable room, an attached bathroom and a verandah — were successfully installed in the Kullu and Mandi areas of Himachal Pradesh.
The project was launched in the wake of more than 500 families being rendered homeless by the August 2023 tragedy. “Our experience showed that homeless families take at least one or two years to build a new permanent home and move into it,” said Debashish Sen, the director of PSI.
PSI is well placed to know. Established in 1988 by a group of professionals from the Indian Institute of Technology and their well-wishers, the NGO operates in a variety of fields besides disaster rehabilitation, among them livelihoods, natural resource management and river conservation.
The Himachal disaster shelter intervention started to take shape in September 2023. Between September and November 2023, the PSI and Tata Trusts teams finalised the project’s operational guidelines. PSI collaborated with Ashok B Lall Architects to design prototyped shelters that could withstand the challenging terrain and weather conditions of the Himalayan region.
A team led by principal architect Ashok Lall and project architect Shruti Goel guided the construction process. The team recommended a shelter with a floor area of 180 sq ft, inclusive of a toilet. While the initial plan was to use wooden logs and corrugated iron sheets to construct the shelters, reusable and insulated units on a steel framework were eventually employed. This change resulted in an eco-friendly and reusable option.
The project also covered the development of training materials and guidelines for constructing the units. Despite winter rains and harsh weather conditions, training was provided to local artisans, mechanics, welders and beneficiaries on construction, assembly and upkeep of the shelters.
The draft design of the shelters was prepared and criteria for selecting the beneficiaries were finalised in consultation with the local gram panchayats. District disaster management authorities were also brought on board for consultation.
“This is the first time that we have conceived and deployed a sustainable, reusable solution for disaster relief and rehabilitation,” says Ms Srivastava. “We hope this will prove to be a ready solution that can be quickly set up and put to use in times of need.”
Weather the adversary
For PSI, the project had its fair share of challenges, with the weather being a constant adversary. The remoteness of the affected areas made transportation of material from the fabrication site difficult. Electricity supply was often disrupted and generators had to be employed to assemble the fabricated materials.
Through the project, the design team improved the shelter design based on user feedback, adapting to specific needs and site conditions. “Our design focused on creating reusable, insulated shelters that could be easily assembled and dismantled,” says Mr Lall.
Assessing the durability and reusability of these shelters beyond the relief phase would provide valuable insights for improving future disaster responses and scaling similar initiatives. “The handbooks and posters developed through the project will help in knowledge dissemination among concerned stakeholders and contribute to the scaling up of the initiative,” explains Subhash Rawat, field assistant with PSI.
A key learning from the project has been the importance of balancing speed and quality in disaster response, especially in remote areas. “We saw that local governance structures, such as gram panchayats, are crucial in beneficiary identification and site selection,” says Bigrai Narzari, programme officer at the Tata Trusts. “Also, dealing with weather disruptions and supply-chain challenges taught us the value of incorporating buffer time and contingency planning in project timelines.”
Project architect Shruti Goel sums up the project experience well: “Witnessing the positive impact on the lives of the beneficiaries, who can now rebuild and restart with dignity, has been truly rewarding.”
