All You Need To Know About 'Housing For All' Mission

Addressing a joint session of Parliament on June 9, 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had declared he wanted everyone in the country to have a house “with water connection, toilet facilities, 24x7 electricity supply and access” by the time India completed 75 years since its Independence.

The message was basic, but for a country where homelessness is common across urban and rural spheres, it had a special meaning. Modi, whose Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power at the Centre in May 2014 after a roaring victory in the Lok Sabha elections, pledged to address this basic issue that his processors had not been able to tackle. Launching housing schemes has been a popular feature of subsequent governments since India's Independence in 1947; the success of these schemes, though, has not always been very encouraging.

But the 'Housing For All' scheme, right since its launch, has been one of the most talked-about subjects, both among intellectuals and the common man. The mission has ignited hopes and is expected to boost housing in India in a big way.

PropGuide looks at the main features of the scheme:

The target

Covering an urban area consisting of 4,041 statutory towns, the scheme will be implemented in three phases, with an initial focus on Class-I towns. Under the scheme, the government plans to build two crore houses and it would be a state's prerogative to decide the beneficiaries of the mission.

The period

The mission is expected to be completed in seven years. The timeline for implementing it has been fixed at 2015 to 2022.

The approach

The mission plans to house the urban poor by using four methods:

• By rehabilitating slum dwellers, taking private developers on board

• By promoting affordable housing for weaker sections through credit-linked subsidy 

• By engaging public and private sectors to promote affordable housing

• By subsidising individual constructions or building improvements.

Under a technology sub-mission, modern, innovative and green technologies will be adopted to maintain quality while delivering projects faster. The mission also calls for easing up the urban land market for housing by putting in place certain reforms. For one, houses constructed under the mission would be allotted in the name of the woman of the households, or in the joint name of a man and his wife. 

The funds

• The Centre will provide Rs 1 lakh for each unit under the slum rehabilitation programme. States, on their part, would facilitate the process by providing land.

• For housing loans of up to 15 years, economically weaker sections (EWSes) and low-income group (LIG) households will be given an interest subsidy of 6.5 per cent under credit-linked interest subsidy. Here, the subsidy payout on the net-present-value basis would be about Rs 2.3 lakh per house.

• The Centre would provide Rs 1.5 lakh per unit for the EWS category under the affordable housing, while states will facilitate the process.