Hardeep Singh Puri, Union Minister for Housing and Urban Affairs, said the new Credit Linked Subsidy Scheme (CLSS) aimed to provide interest subvention for homes for low-income groups, will be announced in a couple of weeks.
He made this statement at the annual conclave on Shaping India’s Urban Agenda-2023, organised by Janaagraha in New Delhi.
The issues of India’s rapid urbanisation and the state of our under-governed and badly governed cities were the subject of some serious day-long discussions by politicians, administrators, academics, and experts.
Janaagraha is an NGO cum think tank that has been working since 2001 with citizens and governments to improve the quality of life in Indian cities.
The chief guest Hardeep Singh Puri started on a candid note, saying, "I am not sure when people refer to me as one of the longest-serving ministers of urban affairs, whether I am being lauded or made aware of the huge unfinished tasks on improving our cities and urban centres." Puri reminded that the BJP government over its past two terms has raised the allocation to his ministry fivefold — from Rs 8,000 crore in FY2010 to Rs 47,000 crore in FY22.
He also enumerated his government’s flagship schemes like Swachh Bharat Mission and AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation) through which large grants have been made to states and urban local governments to improve water supply, sanitation, sewerage and stormwater drains. The PM Awas Yojana has helped subsidised housing for crore families, he said.
The other notable speaker at the conclave was NITI Aayog CEO BVR Subrahmanyam, who said that the public policy think tank has picked up 20 cities where it wants to identify the growth drivers and strengthen them. Subrahmanyam pointed out that cities can grow, thrive, and can also die if they don’t stay in step with the theme of economic growth. He added that the PM is extremely conscious of the need for planned urbanisation and has expressed a need for more NITI Aayogs to be set up at the state level and even in the private space.
The high point of the conclave was the release of the report of Janaagraha’s Annual Survey of India’s City Systems (ASICS). This year’s report was prepared by the Janaagraha team headed by CEO Srikanth Viswanathan after studying municipal laws of all states, CAG reports, or urban bodies and the implementation of the various laws and schemes.
The report concluded that Indian cities need 10 vital instruments of change including Spatial Development Plans for all major cities, design standards for public spaces like roads, footpaths, bus-stands, and constitutional amendments to empower cities with elected councils that have real power and sources of finance.
(Edited by : Sangam Singh)
First Published: Oct 18, 2023 9:34 PM IST
