Jr Badal has another dream!: Kanwar Sandhu The other day, the Deputy Chief Minister, Sukhbir Singh Badal announced that the Punjab Government would provide reasonably priced houses to all by 2022. In the first phase of the scheme, 1 Lakh houses would be constructed by October 2016. He said that these houses would be provided at 10 per cent of the total cost of construction and these will have all the basic facilities. He also asked various departments to identify land in various cities and rural areas for the houses for the economically poor sections. While on the face of it, it looks like a good move but one wonders if in practice, Punjab will be able to achieve anything even close to this. One wishes the Government had identified the land, made concrete plans on the type of houses to be provided and the amenities that would be provided in these houses. What is really important is the type of houses that will be built, cost of each dwelling and the criteria for allotment. Where will the cash-strapped State Government get the money for this scheme? A lot of times such schemes fail because of either location or affordability. I remember how a few years ago such houses for Dalits on the outskirts of the cities and villages in Punjab had no takers as the occupants found it difficult to commute to their residential areas from place of work. Jr Badal has earned the reputation of making tall promises without doing proper home work. One hopes this scheme is also not one of his dream projects only!
Posted on: Mon, 22 Sep 2014 17:51:00 +0000