10 months on,state govt zeroes in on two projects

State government sources concede that the main reason for the poor show is the fact that the government has still not decided about its share of funding for the project. While the Central government provides 50 per cent of the grants for each project,the beneficiary or the urban local body proposing the scheme is expected to bear a minimum of 12.5 per cent of the cost. The remaining cost has to be borne by the state government.

Even as several other states such as Madhya Pradesh,Andhra Pradesh,Orissa,Rajasthan and Kerala have submitted their pilot projects under the scheme to the Central ministry for approval,the Maharashtra government is still dithering over how much and what per cent of the fund it should provide.

“The only reason we have chosen to forward the Mira Road and Chandrapur projects for the ministry’s sanction is because in these two cases the municipal corporation or the beneficiary has agreed to bear the remaining 50 per cent of the expenses without relying on state funding,” said a state housing department official. While the Mira Road project comes up to Rs 94.60 crore,the Chandrapur one is estimated to cost Rs 3.4 crore — half of the funding will come from the Centre.

The Centre has already provided the Maharashtra government an initial grant of Rs 9.50 crore for preparing a slum-free action plan for each city,carrying out GIS mapping and socio-economic profile of the households and their livelihoods.

RAY was launched by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation in August 2011 and looks at creating an enabling environment for stemming slum proliferation in cities with more than one lakh population. This is to be done through grant of security of tenure,mortgage rights and funding to rebuild the houses in the slums.

“The municipal corporations can also use the money available under RAY to construct transit camps for rehousing project-affected people,creating rental housing or for building night shelters. But unless the state government has a clear cut policy about its share in the funding,the scheme is stuck in a gridlock,” said an official.