With an eye on civic body polls, the Naveen Patnaik government has decided to regularise the occupation of slum dwellers if they are in possession of land less than 30 square metres.
The Odisha Land Rights to Slum Dwellers Act, 2017, has been enacted with a view to assign land rights to identified slum dwellers for council area, not exceeding 45 sq.m. and where the slum is situated within the Notified Area Council area, not exceeding 60 sq.m. shall be settled in favour of the slum dwellers.
“If a slum dweller is in possession of land less than 30 sq.m., land shall be settled as the extent of occupation,” the Cabinet decided.
As per the norms of housing for all policy, 21 sq.m. of carpet area is required to construct an affordable housing unit.
“Considering the provisions of Housing Policy, it would be essential that where a slum dweller is in occupation of land which is less than 30 sq.m., such slum dweller shall be settled with up to 30 sq.m. of land, subject to availability of land,” according to the Cabinet.
The civic body polls in Odisha are long overdue as tenure of 65 local bodies ended almost two years ago. The notification for preparation of the electoral rolls will be done by the SEC only after the State government completes the delimitation process and determines reservation of seats.
