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THEME PAPER
Facilitation flagship housing programme, Hence, it is no longer possible
the Pradhan Mantri Awas to propose one-size-fits-
Prior to the pandemic, Yojana. The Affordable all and simplistic policy
civil society organisations Rental Housing Complexes
working with unorganised (ARHC) scheme, announced approaches. Leaning on
workers had already piloted in 2020, sought private sector literature from complexity
the migrant resource centre participation to retrofit governance that rejects both
(MRC) as a model to support unoccupied public housing overly rational approaches
migrants with reliable for rental purposes as well that are unable to address
information and networks. as build new affordable complex policy issues and
Some state governments (e.g. rental housing stock. While chaotic approaches that rely
Odisha) had set up MRCs in on relativism, Scholten (2019)
destination locations while announced during the proposed mainstreaming as a
partnerships between civil pandemic and framed in middle path. Mainstreaming
society employers and local terms of a response to help is a reflexive approach to
governments were also the urban poor and facilitate policymaking, where actors
operational (e.g. Tirupur). the integration of migrant understand the underlying
The pandemic has laid greater workers in cities, the scheme causes and effects of both
emphasis on the MRC as a addresses a broader need the policy problem as well
model to address problems to diversify urban housing as solutions and make
of information asymmetry supply. At present, as per the adjustments over time.
2
and facilitation. In parallel, scheme’s official website , Instead of seeing migration
common service centres nearly 30 retrofitting projects
(CSCs) that connect citizens and one greenfield project is as a stand-alone policy area, it
to government services in the pipeline. focuses on actor networks and
through agents have also MAINSTREAMING AS A evolving processes to improve
started to focus on migrants POLICY APPROACH responses continually. Most
as a category of customers. importantly, mainstreaming
For instance, Chalo Network Scholars like Scholten (2019) involves embedding
identifies, trains and who studied the migration migration into mainstream
positions agents in migrant- policy responses in the policies, institutions and
sending and migrant- European Union during the structures. This entails a
receiving communities to refugee crisis a few years broad-based approach rather
deliver services related to ago realised that migration, than an issue-specific one.
documentation and identity, akin to issues like gender and
financial inclusion, welfare A prima facie analysis of the
and healthcare. environment, had become policy responses described in
a complex policy problem. the previous section indicates
Housing Migration takes on many that ‘mainstreaming’ could
The Ministry of Urban Affairs, forms in terms of duration, be a plausible approach to
Govt. of India responded frequency and spatiality. It is thinking about migration
to the crisis by adding a no longer sectorally aligned policy in India. First,
rental housing component but embedded in almost the responses show that
to the Government of India’s every facet of development. migration as a policy issue
is no longer strictly located
2 See http://arhc.mohua.gov.in/ under the purview of labour
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