Mohalla - Approaching Affordable Housing

School of Planning and Architecture, Bhopal

Project idea

An independently led exercise to better understand housing as a process, the project begins with deconstructing an existing housing project in regard to its project schemes, designed architecture, and on-site construction. Understanding several parameters to the housing process, and through an outside-in and inside-out process, the achieved module is small and flexible better adapting to the site profile while achieving needed quality in space.

Project description

With an estimated population of 1.36 Billion, and 22% of its population below the poverty line, affordable housing is a constant need in the Indian context. Over the 7 decades since independence, the government has launched consistent schemes and initiatives to facilitate affordable housing, and yet the state of housing in the state is only numbers to boast of.

Affordable housing is a play of trade-offs between cost-effectiveness, functionality, and numbers, with livability as a byproduct of all. Mohalla is an attempt at rationalising these trade-offs, aiming to yield a human-centric housing project through simple yet thoughtful design strategies.
Atop Bhopal’s Idgah Hills is an affordable housing project for nearby slum dwellers carried out under the Rajeev Awas Yojana (R.A.Y.) and Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (P.M.A.Y.). Featuring 3328 Dwelling Units in 52 mid-rise towers, the project lacks an overall master-plan with open spaces being either access roads as a measure of building codes or interstitial pockets.

Achieved through a part to whole, and whole to part process, The Affordable Housing features a myriad of spaces for individual, family, and community living. The design is also compliant with existing development codes, the National Building Code, and the MPBVY.

Technical information

At the heart of the Housing are the dwelling units; designed to interlock and form a 4 unit module and further the housing project, the units feature two rooms, a kitchen, a separate toilet and bathroom all within 32M2. The module is parameterised to have a 12.5M x 12.5M footprint for a better interaction within the NBC regulated 50M x 75M grid.

An attention to detail and small design features like low height mezzanines, storage niches, and alcoves greatly enhance the livability of the dwelling units.

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