Community Halls and poverty

There are numerous studies which conclude that the poor tend to spend a far disproportionate share of their meagre incomes on festivals, weddings, funerals and other personal functions. The latest addition is an article in the Journal of Economic Perspectives, by Esther Duflo and Abhiit Banerjee of the MIT, who find that the poor spend over 10% of their income on such occassions. Naturally, it becomes an area of concern for policy makers and implementors. The challenge will be to incentivize the poor to spend less on such functions and channelise these savings to other more productive areas like food, children's education etc.

In stark contrast to this imperative, we at Vijayawada Municipal Corporation (VMC) have been for some years been doing exactly the opposite. We have been incentivizing the poor residents of slums to spend more on such functions, by covering all the 150 odd slums in the city with community function halls. On the face of it, this appears a laudable effort, with the local residents and the area councillors being its most vociferous supporters. But I will argue that, far from helping the poor this has been to their detriment.

The poor people in slums have historically had their well established way of organizing their family and community functions. These functions used to be held in small open grounds, which now house these community halls or along the more wider road margins or even the street itself. A shamiana and a makeshift stage used to be erected. Even the private individual functions of each household used to be organized as community functions with active participation of all the neighbours, apart from the relatives. The neighbours used to share resources like vessels, chairs and tables, apart from their voluntary physical labor. With limited space available, the numbers of people attending such funcitons also used to be smaller.

Into this environment was introduced the community hall. The VMC built these community halls under the British Government assisted ODA program. With the arrival of these larger community halls, the character of the private and community functions took a different turn. In contrast to the road-side, neighbour assisted community function, every event now shifted to the community hall. With all the requirements of a full fledged auditorium, the logistics increased. The number of people attending these private functions increased. Since the VMC had leased out these halls to private individuals to maintain, the rental charges became an additional burden. The community hall lease holder started supplying food and other logistics for the function, at a cost. With all these the expenditures soared.

There are some comparative figures. A traditional road-side, neighbour involved private function would cost about Rs 5000-6000, by way of function logistics. In contrast, the community hall function costs around Rs 10000-12000. The loss is not merely monetary. These functions were a useful occasion for the neighbourhood and the community to get and bond together, thereby generating valuable social capital.

Now, critics may argue that this is another of those arguments which tries to romanticise the practices of the poor. But my contention is simple - community halls have made slum functions more expensive and therefore willy-nilly makes the poor spend more on their functions and festivals. It is undoubtedly true that increasing consumerism and the spread of television channels have contributed considerably in creating this trend. But the Government have also surely contributed its share by providing greater opportunities for the poor to spend more.