BHUBANESWAR: The State Government will set up 21 more shelters for urban homeless (SUH) soon, sources in the Housing and Urban Development department said. Currently, 26 shelters are functioning in the State that work as transit homes and care to the needs of destitute and urban homeless persons of different age-groups.To facilitate rehabilitation of more such people, 21 more shelters will be set up shortly in a phased manner, sources said, adding that a decision to this effect has been taken during a recent meeting of the State-level committee on SUH.
The committee report suggests that two SUHs have already been constructed with an investment of `80 lakh which will be made functional soon. Besides, 15 SUHs are under construction in various districts for which the State Government has already sanctioned `3.51 crore so far. `16 lakh has also been released to start construction work of four more SUHs. Besides, officials said status of eight more SUHs for which the State Government had released around `64 lakh is uncertain. Some of these SUH projects have already been cancelled.
On the other hand, management of the 26 existing shelters which have catered to the needs of 3.35 lakh destitutes so far, including 50,320 differently-abled persons, the State Government has engaged nine different organisations.In Bhubaneswar, seven such SUHs are functioning at Ganga Nagar, Ashok Nagar, Chandrasekharpur, Bhimpur and Mali Sahi for the homeless. The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation has engaged two NGOs for operation and management of these SUHs.