Centre approves construction of over 168,000 houses under PMAY-Urban

This takes the total number of houses sanctioned so far to 11 million, according to a statement on Thursday.

The government has approved the construction of over 1.68 lakh (168,000) houses in urban areas under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, taking the total number of houses sanctioned so far to 1.1 crore (11 million), according to a statement on Thursday.

The Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry said that the decision was taken at a meeting of the Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee (CSMC) where officials from 14 states and union territories participated on Wednesday.

The statement said that the houses sanctioned by the CSMC are proposed to be constructed in verticals like beneficiary-led construction, affordable housing in partnership and in-situ slum redevelopment under the PMAY (Urban).

"The states also put in their proposals for revision of projects due to various issues such as, of land, topographical hazards, inter-city migration and change of preferences of verticals among others," the ministry said.

Under PMAY-U, 41 lakh houses have been completed so far while construction is in various stages in more than 70 lakh houses.

"Construction of 1,68,606 new houses have been approved in the meeting of the Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee (CSMC) under the PMAY (Urban)," the ministry said.

The PMAY(U), launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in June 2015, aims to ensure "Housing for all by 2022". The government has set a target of 1.12 crore houses to be constructed in urban areas in the country over a period of seven years from 2015 to 2022.

"The progress under the Mission (PMAY-U) has been steady. We have to move towards completion of houses with all the basic physical and social infrastructure," Ministry Secretary Durga Shanker Mishra was quoted as saying in a statement.

Mishra said, "The states/UTs will focus on completion and delivery of houses to beneficiaries."

The secretary urged states and union territories to expedite the implementation of the Affordable Rental Housing Complexes (ARHCs) scheme.

"All the states/UTs may also learn from the six Light House Projects (LHPs) initiated in six cities , namely, Agartala (Tripura), Ranchi (Jharkhand), Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh), Indore (Madhya Pradesh), Rajkot (Gujarat) and Chennai (Tamil Nadu). The technology can be replicated and scaled across the country for mass housing," he said.