Uttarakhand Cabinet approves new slum policy

  Uttarakhand cabinet on Tuesday approved a new slum policy under which the government will provide a house or a plot to each family residing in slum areas.  

"The government has approved a new state slum policy which will benefit nearly 7.5 lakh people living in 582 slum clusters," urban development principal secretary Ranbir Singh told reporters after a meeting of the state cabinet in Dehra Dun.

Under the policy, the government would provide a new house or a plot to each family residing in the slum areas.

The government would provide an identity card to each individual living in the slums and provide an 800 sq ft plot or a 300 sq ft constructed house on subsidised rates for 10 years lease to each of the family.

After the lease period is over, the owners will have the provision to free hold their property for sale, Singh said.

A master plan will be prepared specifically for each of the district as well as the slum cluster, he said.

Singh, however, did not specify whether these slum areas would be regularised or not. "A working formula is yet to be prepared in this regard," he said.

The government has also made it mandatory for private developers and the government agencies to reserve 25 per cent of the houses for urban poor in order to check encroachments.

The government would not allow any further slums to be set up in any area, Singh said.

From now, new houses constructed on over 500 sq mt areas will have a servant quarter.

Similarly, houses constructed on more than 1,000 sq mt will have two servant quarters.

"These provisions are being made in order to check further spread of slum clusters," Singh said.

Significantly, the new slum policy came at a time when the Assembly elections are just two months away with the ruling BJP trying to consolidate its vote bank among the urban poor.