the goan I network
PANAJI
For over a year now the State government and its implementing agencies have failed to identify slums in Goa suitable for redevelopment under the Prime Minister’s Awas Yojana although the shanties exist in Zuarinagar, Chimbel, Camrabhat and other regions.
Sources in the State administration said, the slums in Goa do not fit the bill under the module envisaged in the PMAY scheme and will qualify for redevelopment only after norms are modified to suit local conditions.
One of the major aims of the PMAY is to provide better homes to slum dwellers through private participation, using land as a resource. The current slum redevelopment module of the scheme is unattractive for private players, said an urban planner tasked with the job of identifying slums for re-development.
None-the-less riding on the shoulders of another module of PMAY the Goa government is in the process of finalising two major housing projects in South Goa which will collectively raise 600 homes for economically weaker sections.
PMAY is an ambitious national-level project launched in
2015 and aims to accomplish the housing-for-all goal by 2022. It was made applicable to Goa in 2017 with a target of building 5000 houses in five years.
Thus far, the PMAY scheme has managed to rope in 170 economically weaker and low-income beneficiaries from urban areas in Goa. They have been sanctioned loans, wherein the interest component is subsidized.
The 170 economically weaker low and middle-income applicants have already been sanctioned loans with a 3.5-6.5 per cent interest subsidy component.
Another module of the PMAY scheme entails central funding to Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) and other local implementing agencies to provide housing for urban poor but none of the State’s civic bodies have come up with proposals to avail it.
Yet another module of the scheme provides affordable housing through projects developed in partnership by the beneficiaries and the government. Each beneficiary is entitled to a Rs 3.5 lakh subsidy with the State government providing Rs 2 lakh and the Centre Rs 1.5 lakh.
The PMAY scheme also provides subsidy for individual house constructions as well as expansion of existing homes. Sixty new constructions under this scheme have already been approved in Goa with the State government contributing Rs 2 lakh and the Centre giving Rs 1.5 lakh to each of the beneficiaries.
