NEW DELHI: Only 26% of funds sanctioned under three different verticals of the government’s flagship PM Awas Yojana (Urban) has been utilised in last six years of its implementation and as a result, only 30% of the sanctioned houses could be constructed during the period.
Only 25% of the sanctioned funds have been spent under In-Situ Slum Redevelopment (ISSR), while the percentage for Affordable Housing in Partnership (AHP) segment is 26%. Beneficiary Led Construction (BLC) vertical also showed similar pattern with only 27% of sanctioned budget spent.
Poor fund utilisation reflected in delivery of houses. According to the data from Ministry of Housing (till mid-March 2021), only 5,16,764 houses have been delivered under AHP segment against the sanctioned number of 23,31,229. Similarly, 19.53 lakh houses have been constructed under BLC as against the sanctioned 68.69 lakh houses.
Under slum redevelopment segment, only 4,54,460 houses were sanctioned and 4,46,777 houses completed till mid-March this year and majority of this includes incomplete works of earlier JNURM scheme taken up and completed for slums after 2014. Government document disclosed only about 18,000 houses have been completed under ISSR in a few states. Recently, a parliamentary committee in its report noted that only 8 states have taken up projects under the ISSR vertical.
The focus of the ISSR, AHP and BLC verticals of the Mission is to provide housing assets to economically weaker sections of society. Under AHP, central assistance of `1.5 lakh per house is provided in projects where at least 35% of the houses are for EWS category. Under BLC, upto `1.5 lakh of central assistance is provided through States/UTs to each of eligible beneficiaries.
Nearly 14 lakh houses have been acquired by the beneficiaries under credit linked CLSS component which provides interest subsidy of 6.5% to EWS/Low Income Group (`3-6 lakh per annum) and interest subsidy of 4% and 3%, respectively, to Middle Income Group (`6-12 lakh and `12-18 lakh per annum, respectively) on housing loans.
The housing ministry recently celebrated the sixth anniversary of PMAY-U, under the aegis of ‘Housing for All’, which addresses urban housing shortage among the EWS/LIG and MIG categories including slum dwellers by ensuring a ‘pucca’ house to all eligible urban households by 2022, when the nation completes 75 years of Independence. A total of 1.12 crore houses have been sanctioned under the scheme.
The ministry is implementing PMAY(U) since June 2015 for addressing the housing requirement of people belonging to EWS, Low Income Group and Middle Income Group categories in urban areas. The estimated demand under the scheme reported by States/UTs is around 1.12 crore.