Imagine having to live on the streets, in unbearable conditions, never knowing what it is like to be in a stable environment. Home, the one place where we let go of all our worries, the safe paradise which we thrive for at the end of a tiring day, is unfortunately still a dream for many.
With no place to sit or fall asleep, one in every hundred people in urban India is suffering due to homelessness. Shockingly, Delhi alone houses over 1,50,000 homeless people.
Even though the state government has established nearly 300 shelters for the accommodation of over 20,000 people, only 40% of the system’s capacity is put to use, housing merely 8,000 people from the homeless population, proving that homeless people would rather sleep in the streets under the open skies than using homeless shelters. But the question is, why?
Lack of cleanliness, an apathetic attitude of caretakers towards the occupants, unavailability of basic amenities, fear of theft and violence amongst the occupants are some of the major reasons cited by such people for not staying in the homeless shelters.
They often struggle to obtain and maintain access to a reliable and stable income. While most of these people are completely dependent on shelters, others resort to begging or are working in the informal sector. Recently, their economic hardships increased tremendously since many of them lost their jobs owing to the pandemic.
With a firm resolve to seek a sustainable solution to these coexisting problems, we created Project BASERA. Initiated in June 2020, Basera aims at improving the situation of homelessness by providing employment opportunities while sensitising the community and undertaking managerial and infrastructural improvement.
Through baseline surveys, we witnessed the condition of women in homeless shelters who have no stable source of income and decided to work towards their upliftment through the creation of various job opportunities by utilising the plethora of upcycling opportunities which exist in regular waste items.
In the meantime, India became the second-largest producer of PPE in the world with over 100 manufacturers producing 4.5 million pieces of PPEs daily, owing to the pandemic. As a result, a large amount of scrap that is left behind containing small amounts of plastic that cannot be recycled and disposed of easily is either burnt or end up in oceans, contributing significantly to marine pollution.
We saw this pressing concern as an opportunity to provide employment to homeless women by utilising this unused PPE scrap to make multi-purpose mats through an innovative technique.
While researching and developing ways to provide more employment opportunities, we expanded our research and found that roughly 165 billion cardboard boxes are shipped each year in India which equates to 1 billion trees being chopped. Recycling 1 tonne of cardboard saves approximately 7,000 gallons of water and 17 trees from being cut while reducing the waste generation and overburdening of landfills.
We transformed this grave problem into a business opportunity by expanding our operations through the identification of an efficient way to transform corrugated boxes into cost-effective and sustainable furniture options.
One thing every individual strives to be is self-sufficient and reliant. However, a year ago, for these homeless women living in these shelters under the debt of society, it was a distant dream.
Through Basera, the foundation for their transformation and social empowerment has been laid. Our journey has been filled with unprecedented challenges and opportunities and we will not halt until our vision of providing a better living to more such people is accomplished.