A study of social issues of unauthorized residents in urban areas; special reference to city area in Eheliyagoda

Abstract

Urbanization is an integral part of modernization and development. With the Influence of the pushing factors in rural areas and the pulling factors in urban areas, people are rapidly migrating to cities. Low-income people move to the urban areas and they select city terminals as a residential area and build houses. The main objective of this study is to identify the social problems of unauthorized residents in urban areas. Besides, the focus is given to the factors affecting the growth of unauthorized residents in urban areas, the issues facing by them, their impact on urban development, and measures that should be taken to address them. The researcher has selected the Eheliyagoda city area as a study area and it is located inside the Eheliyagoda DSD in Rathnapura district. Both primary and secondary data have been used for this study. Questionnaire and face to face interviews have been used to collect primary data. Information was obtained through questionnaires from 40 houses which are located in urban reserves in Eheliyagoda under the random sampling method. Also, information was collected from the Grama Niladhari, Development Officer, Divisional Secretariat Officers, and Urban Development Authority Officers by face to face interviews. The secondary data was collected from books, journals, reports, maps, the internet used to analysis data. The collected data was thus revised, coded and categorized. Microsoft Office; Excel and Geographic Information System were used to create the maps. According to the analysis, it was concluded that the unauthorized residents of the urban reserves in Eheliyagoda had many social problems in the area and had a direct impact on urban development. Accordingly, to mitigate the challenges caused by these unauthorized residents, they should be provided permanent residences and create income sources and a better mechanism to educate their children. Moreover, Unauthorized residents should be removed from valuable lands belonging to urban areas and directed to the effective development of the city.