The government was taking steps to achieve the objective of making the State slum-free by 2023 as outlined in the Vision 2023 announced by former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, said Udumalai K. Radhakrishnan, Minister for Housing and Urban Development, here on Friday.
The former Chief Minister had announced that 10 lakh houses would be built under the Housing for All Mission.
During 2017-18, three lakh houses have been targeted to be built and about one lakh houses were currently under construction, he said after inspecting the construction of 685 dwelling units by the TNSCB at Peechankulam in the city on Friday. The project, being executed at an estimate of ₹46.35 crore, at Peechankulam would be completed soon, he added.
Later, Mr. Radhakrishnan chaired a regional level meeting with stake holders and district-level officers of the division to review the implementation of the programme.
A press release issued after the meeting said Tamil Nadu was in the forefront in obtaining approvals for projects from the Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee and approval has been obtained for 2,46,268 housing units at a cost of ₹8660.06 crore.
The Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board (TNSCB) is the State-level nodal agency for the implementation of the Union government’s Housing for All Mission in the State. The mission, includes four components of in-situ slum redevelopment, credit linked subsidy scheme, affordable housing in partnership and beneficiaries-led construction.
An assessment of housing requirement has been completed in Corporations, municipal towns and town panchayats and as per the demand assessment and online applications received, the requirement of houses was around 9.73 lakh.
In Tiruchi division of TNSCB, covering Tiruchi, Karur, Perambalur, Ariyalur, Thanjavur, Tiruvarur, Nagapattinam, Pudukottai, Cuddalore and Villupuram districts, the total housing requirement is about 2.37 lakh houses. So far, 332 projects envisaging the construction of 55,163 dwelling units at a cost of ₹1,886.23 crore in these districts has been approved by the Centre.
The State government has made sufficient budget provision to implement the programme.
Vellamandi N. Natarajan, Minister for Tourism, P. Kumar, MP, Shambu Kallolikar, Principal Secretary and Managing Director, TNSCB, and K. S. Palanisamy, Collector, also participated in the review.
