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Displacement and Rehabilitation

With growing advancement more and more Displacement and Rehabilitation activities are going on. In ancient times nature was a major cause of displacement but growing modernity and urbanisation and developmental actvities are now the major reasons for rehabilitation.

Causes of Displacement and Rehabilitation

People get uprooted from their traditional moorings due to various reasons. They are known as displaced people. Displacement can be broadly grouped into five categories:

1. Displacement due to natural calamities
2. Displacement due to political, racial, religious and other upheavals.
3. Displacement due to developmental activities
4. Displacement due to social inequalities
5. Displacement due to physical and psychic factors.

Some of the displacements are generally sudden and unanticipated and require some period of relief before rehabilitation. In the case of displacement due to developmental activities advance planning and implementation are possible. Social inequalities leading to displacement require rehabilitation emphasis on specific social groups and in the case of physical factors; rehabilitation is at the individual level.

Any rehabilitation measure has to be based on certain understandings. The people displaced are uprooted from home to which they show deep attachment and from their socio-economic life in which they are traditionally rooted. They need to be rehabilitated not physically and economically but socially and psychologically as well. Rehabilitation is a long drawn process and involves understanding of problems involved, proper planning and coordinated efforts of specialists from various disciplines including anthropology, social work, administration and affected people.