"I think there are no poor in Delhi as there has not been a single application from here for approval under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana," said Venkaiah Naidu, minister for urban development, housing and urban poverty alleviation. Speaking on the progress of the scheme he said the government had approved construction of 17,73,573 homes under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, which was launched 22 months ago.
"This is several notches better than the 13,82,768 approvals the previous regime cleared in two terms," said Naidu, while enumerating the progress in the scheme, which envisages housing for all by 2022, the 75th year of independence. This entails construction of 1.0088 crore units. The scheme is to support housing construction activity with incentives and soft loans. The steps include the passing of the Real Estate Development Act, allowing 100 FDI in the scheme, and income tax exemption on profits of affordable housing construction.
"15 states and Union territories have been chosen to complete the target by 2019," he said. These include Kerala, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Sikkim, Tripura, Andaman and Nicobar, Chandigarh, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, and Puduchery. The other larger states are expected to meet the target by 2022.
"Owning a decent house is a fundamental aspiration of every Indian specially those at the bottom of the economic pyramid," the minister said. He added that an investment of nearly one lakh crore has been approved, as compared to just 32,713 crore under the Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission.
He added that some states were doing well with the speed of construction. These are Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Bihar, Telangana and Tripura.
