Going Underground: All over the world, underground bunkers and high-security homes are suddenly en vogue

April 2016 – SURVIVALISM – Welcome to Switerzerland’s Bunker Hotel. The 17-room La Claustra is part of a quiet trend in Switzerland – adapting decommissioned military fortresses and bunkers for modern use. A few of the bunkers, originally intended as defence strongholds, were sold off by the Swiss military after the Cold War as high maintenance costs kicked in and the threat of armed conflict receded.

More than 50 now have been turned into museums, cheese factories, mushroom farms, and art or data storage centres. Though no official figures are available, most of the country’s 8,000 bunkers and military shelters have been bought, sealed off or set aside for historical preservation, Reuters has reported. Some masquerade as barns or mediaeval houses with painted-on windows, blending into the idyllic Swiss landscape. –Straits Times

Bunkers being constructed for residents in India’s Suchetgarh sector

(India) – JAMMU: Residents of border area in Suchetgarh sector here, who live in constant fear because of ceasefire violations by Pakistan, can now look forward to safe places to hide during such incidents. The government is constructing 18 bunkers in the sector to provide shelter to the people. “A total of 18 bunkers, each spread in 560 square feet area, are being constructed in the Suchetgarh sector. Each bunker has the capacity to accommodate over 150 people,” an official spokesman said. Each bunker is being constructed at a cost of Rs five  lakh, he said.

He said that the Minister for PHE Sham Lal Choudhary along with Member Parliament Rajya Sabha Shamsher Singh Manhas today reviewed the construction work for these concrete bunkers being built as part of the initiative of the Union Home Ministry to ensure safety of residents of the border areas during ceasefire violations along the International Border (IB) and Line of Control (LOC). This pilot program of the government of India is aimed at minimizing the loss of limb and life during border firing or shelling on the LoC and IB, he said. –Indian Express

 Rich elites building high-security, impenetrable homes