NEW DELHI: The Ministry of Rural Development has written to all states informing them about the continuation of the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana- Gramin (PMAY-G) and also urged them to make concrete efforts to ensure the target of 1.95 crore houses is completed by March 2022. The letter states that the rural housing scheme would continue as per the existing norms laid down under PMAY-G phase 1.
“The continuation of the scheme beyond 2019-20 up to 2021-22 in the next finance commission cycle after due appraisal and approval based on third-party evaluation of the programme has also been approved,” the letter said. The renewal of the scheme means that additional eligible households from the final Awas+ list will come into the permanent waiting list (PWL) in states where the PWL has been exhausted. The ceiling for the list is 1.95 crore.
The extension of the scheme will also enable states to borrow from the Centre through the existing mechanism till the validity of the scheme expires. “We want to make sure that funds are not a hindrance in the implementation of the scheme. Hence, we thought it was best that the existing mechanism of borrowing must be in place,” a ministry official said. Throwing more light on the advantages of continuing the scheme in its existing form through to 2022, the official said that the administrative cost would reduce from 4 per cent to 2 per cent.
“Two per cent of the administrative funds would be divided. While 0.30 per cent would be retained by the Centre, the remaining 1.7 per cent would be released for states,” the official said. The continuance of the scheme is mainly aimed at fulfilling the NDA government’s ‘Housing for All’ by 2022 vision.