In a bid to ensure transparency in selection of beneficiaries under various housing schemes meant for poor people, the State government is planning to soon introduce a new legislation.
According to Housing Minister V. Somanna, the proposed legislation would make the tahsildar as well as other officials concerned responsible if there are lapses in selection of beneficiaries. “It would provide for initiating criminal proceedings against officials concerned if rules related to selection of beneficiaries are violated,” the Minister said. He cited instances of rich and politically-influential families getting houses though they were meant for poor.
There were instances of the same house being shown as being allotted to multiple people by officials and village panchayat members, Mr. Somanna alleged. Similarly, in some instances, the panchayat members had misused their powers to grant houses to their relatives, he said.
The proposed legislation would provide for rejecting the decision of grama sabha on selection of beneficiaries if they were found to be not genuine upon verification, he explained. It would be mandatory for the list selected by the grama sabha to be routed through the tahsildar, executive officer of taluk panchayat, and CEO of ZP, besides getting final clearance from a committee led by the Deputy Commissioner of the district.
In addition to this, the government was also considering the possibility of merging various housing schemes barring the Ambedkar housing scheme meant for Dalits.
Slum-free city
The Minister said the government was keen to free Bengaluru city from slums. Bengaluru presently had 432 slum areas accounting for 3.21 lakh families. While the immediate target was to reduce the slums to 150 in the next one year by building one lakh houses, there were plans to achieve at least 80% progress in freeing the city from slums in the next three years, he explained.
The Karnataka Housing Board had plans to build 4,000 apartments with single and double bedroom accommodation in eight places including Hoskote, Challaghatta and Mysuru, he said.
