Karnataka Diaries: Chikkaballapur District Gudibande Taluka

(From the pages of architect’s journal)

Blog post 7 of 8 (Part B: Village Irredypallahali, Kanthanhali, Bathenahali and Dapparthi)

EOD_15^th  May 2019

So, day 2 of Griha started really late as the panchayat had to arrange an auto to the next panchayat.

We reached our next panchayat Dapparthi at 10 am and waited for the bill collector Mr.Gopal till 11 am. As soon as he reached the office, he was boisterous and energetic that our energy just shot up.

He accompanied us for the first two villages. He was a great help and also knew English so it was much easier. 

Completed 

4 villages (20 houses)

FGD of 2 villages

Village 1-Irredypallahali (5 houses)

Village 2-Kanthanhali (5 houses)

Village 3-Bathenahali (5 houses)

Village 4-Dapparthi (5 houses)

Two villages and a lunch break later, we moved to the 3rd and 4th village at 3 pm along with Murthy (village water man) and Yellampa (village officer). Today our halt is in Dapparthi (a terrace room) it’s really windy and nice.

Observations

1. Unlike the previous village, there were a few houses that were strikingly different. But the repetitiveness was still present in most of the newly built houses.

2. The old houses were stone houses mostly (the texture of the stone especially in Dapparthi was pretty and appealing)

3. The rich houses that we did today wasn’t really repetitive with respect to the organizing of spaces. Wall cladding with tiles and granite for flooring was evident.

4. No mesh windows like yesterday though the problem of monkeys was there.

5. Lot more stone roofs were preferred over mould.

6. When it came to sheet roof, asbestos sheets were more prominent than GI.

7. Dapparthi being placed over a rocky terrain the depth of foundation varied from 0 to 6 feet.

8. Washing was preferred to be done outside the compound wall.

9.Toilet and Bathroom were within the compound wall and in the front.

Because they don’t like the idea of toilet alongside pooja room.

10. Some of the big old houses had larger kitchen space and higher counter tops compared to the low-income group of the same age.

Tomorrow we will be moving to the next panchayath Ulladu. Hoping to complete the last 3 villages by tomorrow.

To understand the context of the place and project, please follow this link:

Project Griha: A focus on Rural housing

Karnataka Diaries: Chikkaballapur District Gudibande Taluka

(From the pages of architect’s journal)

Blog post 7 of 8 (Part A: Village Varlakonda, Polumapalli, Bathenahalli)

EOD_14^th May 2019

So, our Griha Gudibande kicked off with a very bumpy and sleepy bus ride.

We reached Perisandhra around 10:30, took a shared auto and headed straight to our first village Varlakonda (the first panchayat) we had to wait for the bill collector for a while, so our day began just after 11:40.

Thankfully we met Mr. Majunath and Mrs. Rukmini from village one and village two, respectively, who spoke English, so communication wasn’t an issue. By the time we reached the third village, many residents knew English, so it wasn’t too hard.

The panchayat people were not keen on helping us. They showed their reluctance from the start.

By the end of the day, we completed three villages (15 houses) and conducted two focus group discussions. They arranged an unused house for our stay (there’s no fan, and Priyanka’s workouts give the room more heat radiation: p). Her lucky stars didn’t disappoint this time too. We had a great lunch (Chapati, sambar, groundnut chutney was super yum!!)

Completed three villages (15 houses)

Village 1 – Varlakonda (5 houses)

Village 2 – Polumapalli (5 houses)

Village 3 – Bathenahalli (5 houses)

Observations

The designs were repetitive. I was very disappointed; there was not even one house which I liked or found interesting. Priyanka also mentioned the same. It’s like we can figure out the plan of the house just by looking at it from outside. (under construction is out of the question)

1. No similar pattern followed in any of the villages.

2. All the rich houses were “one living room, dining space, kitchen, pooja room, two bedroom and toilet under the staircase” plan.

3. Poor and old houses continued to be either a one room house or a living room and kitchen space plan.

4.We observed that most of them have livestock, and hence cowsheds are placed in front, behind, and sideways wherever they have extra space

5.Also most of the windows have meshes because of monkeys. (Yes, there are street monkeys and they are really cute)

6. Agriculture is the major occupation in all the 3 villages.

And for the record, sericulture is not practiced in any of these villages.

Tomorrow we are planning to start by 8 to the next panchayath Dapparthi. We are hoping to see something new and interesting.

Meanwhile a few snapshots of the villages today…

To understand the context of the place and project, please follow this link:

Project Griha: A focus on Rural housing

Karnataka Diaries: Chikkaballapur District: Gauribidanaur Taluka

(From the pages of architect’s journal)

Blog post 6 of 8 (Part C: Villages)

EOD_11^th  May 2019

Day 3

Yes! Here is to the completion of 50 houses at Gauribidanaur Taluka. That one decision to push on the first day made it possible to close the study in three days.

Brief:

Heading towards Nagargere panchayat, we traveled around in an auto with the Bill Collector and the nurse (Hindi speaking), who weren’t very pleased working with us. They were more than glad to let go at the end of the day. Haha!
But, yeah. We needed them.
We requested to be taken to a small, medium, and big village. Aiman handled the conversation bit, and as usual, I saved up my energy and put that into documenting the houses.
We had two FGDs with not much a change in the opinions and perspectives than the previous ones.

Observations:

We have reached that point where there is an overlap of planning and functionality with few variations between the earlier studied ones.
Taking you on a pictorial tour of the villages we visited-

To understand the context of the place and project, please follow this link:

Project Griha: A focus on Rural housing

Karnataka Diaries: Chikkaballapur District: Gauribidanaur Taluka

(From the pages of architect’s journal)

Blog post 6 of 8 (Part B)

EOD_10^th  May 2019

10.05.2019

Day 2 

Day 2 was relatively uneventful but definitely productive. We’ve completed 7 villages by today, that’s 20 houses today! We had one very casual FGD but couldn’t have any more as the villages were mostly empty or people were just unwilling to gather in the hot sun. Villages in this panchayat are quite small and 3 out of the 4 villages we visited had only 100 or so houses in the entire village.

Mr. Khan (from yesterday) came in his car to pick us up. We first went to meet the PO Mr. Balachander from yesterday’s PO. He and another panchayat officer were present in the office, both very entrepreneurial people, who are looking for ways to develop the villages constantly. They were very excited to meet us and we would definitely like to stay in touch with them. 

Straight after meeting them we were dropped to the next panchayat, also with the promise of picking us up and dropping us to Gauribidanaur when we need to board a bus to Bangalore at the end of our trip.

Luckily there was a Hindi speaking clerk who agreed to accompany us today. We called Venkatesh while we were there and he immediately made arrangements for tomorrow’s visit in a predominately Muslim panchayat so hopefully language shouldn’t be a problem.

So, we started the village survey with the Hindi speaking clerk and two other panchayat workers. Transport was through an auto. Halfway through the day we learnt that one of the other officers knows quite a bit of Tamil too (crazy, right?!).

So we covered two villages before lunch and two after. And were done by 4:30. Finally exhausted, we reached back to the panchayat office. One of the officers accompanying us arranged our stay with his sister’s house. It is a pretty well-off family with just a husband and wife staying. We have an entire bedroom to ourself with a bed, ceiling fan and table fan! Best of all, there is a western toilet!

Observations:

Most villages were very poor and had the same repetitive functional plans. Almost all new houses are the exactly the same, with the addition of tile facade now.

Granite tiles were also quite common because of the closeness from stone quarries. 

Sericulture is practiced in some villages but agriculture remains the primary occupation. 

Old low-income houses mostly had stone and Mangalore tiles as their building materials.

To understand the context of the place and project, please follow this link:

Project Griha: A focus on Rural housing