Communist Party of India (CPI) State secretary K. Ramakrishna on Friday assured beneficiaries of the low income group housing scheme that the party will keep up its campaign till each and every allottee is handed over a house by the State government.
As allottees narrated their woes to Mr. Ramakrishna, who visited some of the houses in Ongole and Kandukur towns in Prakasam district along with CPI leaders on Friday as part of the CPI’s action plan to forcibly occupy the houses from Monday. They complained that some ruling YSRCP leaders were trying to remove the names of allotees from the list of beneficiaries though they had fully paid their contribution under the NTR Housing Scheme.
He said he was perplexed as to why the Jagan Mohan Reddy government was delaying handing over of the houses completed by the Andhra Pradesh Township and Infrastrucutre Development Corporation (TIDCO).
“We do not have any objection if the name of the housing scheme is changed by the YSRCP Government in memory of YSR. But the government should rise above party lines and hand over the houses to the allottees,” he said.
Most of the over 7.58 lakh houses, whose construction had been taken up under the previous Telugu Desam Party regime, had been completed but for some finishing touches and common facilities like roads, drains and street lights.
“The CPI will perform house-warming ceremony along with the allotees from Monday if the YSRCP government does not adhere to the Deepavali deadline set by the CPI,” he said.
“We will organise house-warming ceremony in phases across the State till Sankranti (January 15),” said CPI Prakasam district secretary M.L. Narayana.
Mr. Ramakrishna felt that pressure on the government, which had announced construction of 30 lakh houses, would ease if only it handed over to the allottees the houses already constructed.
He also wanted the government to increase the extent of house sites to two cents in urban areas and three cents in rural areas as against the one cent proposed by the State government. He suggested construction of G+3flats to construct more spacious houses for the allottees as houses constructed on a one cent piece of land were too congested.
