Bhubaneswar: On the beginning day of the Budget session of Parliament, the State Government reminded the Centre about its demand for sanction of houses under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana—Gramin (PMAY-G).
Panchayati Raj and Drinking Water Minister Pratap Jena on Monday wrote a letter to Union Minister of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Giriraj Singh on this issue.
Mr.Jena reminded Singh about the demands raised by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and himself through letters and during meetings.
He urged the Union Minister to take necessary steps to synchronize the data of 6.65 lakh households in the State-owned Rural Housing Portal with the Awaas+.
Mr.Jena also demanded sanction of 1.84 lakh Special PMAY (G) houses as promised during May, 2019 to Odisha in the aftermath of cyclonic storm Fani and open of the Awaas+ window for some time to incorporate names of eligible left out families.
While the genuine demand of Odisha has not been paid heed to by the Ministry of Rural Development so far, synchronization of data from Karnataka State Government MIS into Awaas+ was allowed on January 13, 2022, the Minister pointed out.
“Ignoring the repeated requests from the State will not support the cause of Odisha and it will further deprive lakhs of tribal beneficiaries living in the Scheduled areas of the State and deserving poor people belonging to KBK region and Western parts of the State. I would request your august office to rectify this injustice being meted out to the State of Odisha and its people,” Mr.Jena told Mr.Singh in the letter.
In December, the Chief Minister had written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi demanding 14.84 lakh housing units under PMAY-G.
The Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) has allowed identification of eligible left-out families through Awaas+ by March 7, 2019. However, the State could identify only 35,000 families within this stipulated period because of pre-occupation of government machinery in preparatory work for general elections-2019, network connectivity issues and LWE violence in some pockets of State.
The Prime Minister had promised to allot 5 lakh PMAY-G (special) houses to Fani affected families during his visit in May 2019.