CHENNAI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday laid the foundation for the construction of 1,152 tenements with an area of 413 sq ft at Perumbakkam at a cost of Rs 116.27 crore through video conference in the presence of Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam.
These tenements would be allotted to the urban poor/slum families living on the banks of waterways and elsewhere in Chennai.
They are being built as part of the LightHouse Project of the Global Housing Technological Challenge-India under the Prime Minister Awas Yojana (Urban). Under this scheme, the Centre has sanctioned construction of 31,62,720 storeyed tenements and 3,42,769 individual houses at a total cost of Rs 27,000 crore across the country.
“The project includes social amenities like a ration shop, two Anganwadi centres, a library, a milk booth, six shops, a sewage treatment plant and an electrical substation. This project will be completed within 15 months. The technology used for this project will ensure eco-friendly construction fit for diverse climatic quality standards and disaster-proof houses,” the Chief Minister said, speaking on the occasion.
Thanking the Prime Minister for selecting Tamil Nadu which was among the successful six states in the implementation of the “Housing for All” scheme for the Global Housing Technology Challenge – India Project, the Chief Minister said, “Tamil Nadu is the most urbanised state in the country where 48.45 percent of the total population live in urban areas of which 14.63 lakh families live in urban slums.”
To address the difficulties faced by urban slum families, former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa had unveiled Tamil Nadu VISION 2023, which envisaged Slum Free Cities 2 in the state by 2023, recalled Palaniswami. Realising the aspirational housing requirements of urban poor families, she ordered that the tenements must have a bedroom, hall, kitchen, toilet, bathroom and balcony to be built with a plinth area of at least 400 square feet and be provided with fans and electrical fittings.
Under the PMAY-Gramin, the unit cost per house is Rs 1.20 lakh which includes Rs 72,000 from the central government and Rs 48,000 from the state government. Additionally, the state government provides a grant of Rs 50,000 towards reinforced cement concrete roofing. In addition, Rs 23,000 in wages under NREGA is given to each beneficiary for construction of toilets.
“When I reviewed the scheme recently, I found that the present unit cost is insufficient for the poorest of the poor to construct a house due to increase in prices and loss of livelihood due to COVID-19. So I sanctioned Rs.70,000 additionally to each house, increasing the unit cost from Rs 1.70 lakh to Rs 2.40 lakh, costing the state government Rs.1,805 crore for constructing 2.5 lakh houses,” the Chief Minister added.