Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 15 announced a new scheme to help urban poor build houses in cities. Under this programme, they would receive relief in interest rates and loans taken from banks to construct their houses.
Addressing the nation from the ramparts of the Red Fort on the occasion of the 77th Independence Day, Mr. Modi said that weaker sections who live in cities face a lot of problems.
“Middle-class families are dreaming of buying their own houses. We are coming up with a new scheme in the coming years that will benefit those families that live in cities but are living in rented houses, or slums, or chawls and unauthorised colonies.”
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The Prime Minister said that if this section wants to build their own houses, the government will assist them with a relief in interest rates and loans from banks that will help them save lakhs of rupees.
It might be noted that the government already has a scheme to address the housing shortage for the urban poor called the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana Urban (PMAY-U) which was launched in 2015.
The PMAY-U is a flagship mission of the government which is implemented by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA).
The mission aims to address the urban housing shortage among the economically backward sections, including the slum dwellers by ensuring a ‘pucca’ house to all eligible urban households by 2022.
The scheme period though now has been extended up to December 2024 in order to complete all the houses sanctioned without changing the funding pattern and implementation methodology.
A total of 75.51 lakh houses have been completed out of which 71.39 lakh have been occupied till now under the PMAY-U, the government informed the Rajya Sabha.
Uttar Pradesh had the largest number of houses completed at 12,87,307. Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh were other high-performing States at 8,80,209 and 8,08,278 houses completed. The corresponding number for Tamil Nadu was 5,30,350.
The Centre has released ₹1.48 lakh crore assistance to States, the government said in the reply.
