Curation Team
PUNE: Chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Tuesday said Maharashtra is set to provide 30 lakh houses to homeless people under the Pradhan Mantri Awas scheme and become the first state in India to achieve 100% of the target.
He also said a fresh survey would be carried out to identify homeless people who are yet to benefit.
The CM was speaking at a PM Awas Yojana award function in Pune with Union minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan as the chief guest. Deputy CM Ajit Pawar was also present at the event.
Fadnavis said, “The central govt considered the socio-economic survey of 2011 to identify homeless people when the scheme was launched. However, it was full of faults. Only 10 lakh people from the state were named and housing sanctioned to them all. We carried out a fresh survey in 2018 and the number had gone up to 30 lakh.”
Meanwhile, the state govt has expedited the process to provide necessary permissions for houses sanctioned by the Centre to the 30 lakh people. “Maharashtra will become the first state in the country to achieve 100% target under the PM Awas scheme,” he added.
During his speech, Chouhan told the state govt to do yet another survey to zero in on more homeless people. “The Centre has sanctioned houses to all homeless people in Maharashtra as per the 2018 survey. However, I urge the state to conduct a fresh one to see if anyone falling under the category has been left out. If the state provides a fresh list, we will sanction it too.”
