5 days ago
Centre ask states to ensure occupancy of completed houses under affordable housing scheme
New Delhi: Vacant affordable homes built under a flagship government scheme has prompted the Centre to propose a temporary halt on new projects in some cities.
Inadequate infrastructure including water, sanitation, sewerage, electricity and roads is seen as the key reason for people staying away from homes built under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana's (PMAY) Affordable Housing in Partnership (AHP) vertical.
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The housing and urban affairs ministry (MoHUA) in a recent meeting with several states including Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh discussed the issue that is affecting the government scheme to provide all-weather pucca houses to all eligible beneficiaries.
Low occupancy
According to data provided by the ministry to Parliament in March, out of the 118 million houses sanctioned under PMAY, about 90 million have been completed and 87.5 million occupied.
"The occupancy of completed AHP houses under PMAY-U is very low particularly in Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh. States and union territories need to expedite the completion of houses, infrastructure work and allotment of completed AHP houses to the beneficiaries. MoHUA has raised concerns with states and noted that unoccupancy continues due to inadequate infrastructure in several states," said a person in the know of the developments.
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Another person said that states have also been directed to ensure occupancy of completed houses under the Affordable Housing in Partnership (AHP) vertical in a city before starting work on new projects under PMAY-2 in the same city.
The Centre has been advising states to "identify and attach" beneficiaries under the AHP vertical in the initial phase of approval to avoid unoccupancy later stage.
In order to ensure better occupancy under the PMAY (Urban)-2, the government has asked states to ensure that projects under the scheme should come with basic civic amenities like water, sanitation, roads and electricity, said the first person mentioned above.
The Union cabinet in August last year approved PMAY-U 2.0, under which financial assistance is committed for 10 million urban poor and middle-class families through state government and union territories to build, buy or rent a house at an affordable cost in urban areas in five years.
Four verticals
The central government will provide assistance of up to ₹2.50 lakh per house under the scheme. PMAY-U, launched in June 2015, was revamped and launched as PMAY-U 2.0.
The scheme has four verticals through which beneficiaries are supported -- 'Affordable Housing in Partnership' (AHP), Beneficiary-Led Construction (BLC), Affordable Rental Housing (ARH) and Interest Subsidy Scheme (ISS).
Under AHP, financial assistance is provided to beneficiaries from the economically weaker section for owning houses being built with different partnerships by states, union territories, public or private agencies, while under BLC, financial assistance is provided to individual eligible families to construct new houses on their own vacant land, or land provided by the government.
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Queries sent to the union ministry of housing and urban affairs remained unanswered till press time.
"Centre has stressed the need for a case-by-case approach for addressing the occupancy challenges and reasons may differ for different projects and cities. States have also been told to ensure sufficient budgetary allocations to expedite completion of non-started houses under PMAY-U," said the first person mentioned above.
The ministry has suggested geo-tagging all sanctioned houses in a time-bound manner to monitor progress.
The Centre has also suggested that old central or state government-funded houses that are unoccupied are allotted to eligible PMAY-U 2.0 beneficiaries.
