PMAY-G: Only 50 per cent houses completed

NEW DELHI:  The Narendra Modi government’s pet housing for all scheme — the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana-Gramin (PMAY-G) — seems to be running behind the scheduled deadline as only 50 per cent of the targets have been achieved, data from the Rural Development Ministry has revealed.

According to the data, only 1.12 crore of the 2.44 crore houses sanctioned have been completed as of September 11, 2020.

The scheme is part of the government’s promise of ‘Housing For All’ by 2022,  for which the flagship programme of PMAY-G was launched on November 20, 2016. 

Officials say the Covid-19 pandemic had stopped the construction of the houses but will pick up soon as the country has entered Unlock period.  

“The pandemic brought the world to a standstill and this scheme was no different. There was an economic crunch, and disbursement of instalments was hit, so was the pace of the construction due to lack of labour. Now that unlock is underway, the construction and disbursement of funds will be brought back to track soon,” a ministry official said, adding that the numbers could be higher as many states have not updated latest figures on the software.

In terms of numbers, Madhya Pradesh is one of the slowest with completion of only 17 lakh houses, while the state has a target of around 30 lakh houses. Odisha, too, has a similar completion rate with only 12.8 lakh houses being built of the set target of 24.3 lakh houses.