Indira Awaas Yojana delights needy families in Punjab

Abohar (Punjab), April 12 (ANI): Several needy families in Punjab's Abohar city are today a happy lot after getting benefited from the Central Government's Indira Awaas Yojana, a national housing scheme.

Under the scheme, needy families are provided houses free of cost to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, bonded labourers and BPL (below poverty line) families.

The government offers financial assistance to needy families to construct their houses.

In Abohar, several benefited families expressed their gratitude to the government for enabling them to have their own houses. Today, they just wish that more and more people will benefit from the scheme."The houses are really good. They are concrete houses. They are reallyell-constructed. If this house was not available, we would probably be living on the streets. Or we would have to earn and make temporary huts on our own," said Kuldeep Singh, a beneficiary of the scheme.

The Panchayat or, the village council chooses deserving candidates in an organised manner. The council, during a meeting headed by a Block officer, who is a government appointee, opt the beneficiaries.

Resham Singh, the village council head of Sampwali village in Abohar, believes that the scheme is actually beneficial for the needy. He expresses his heartiest thanks to the government for this scheme.

"The Central government's Indira Awaas Yojana is benefiting aot of people. It's giving concrete houses to the people. All these people, who did not have any roof above their head, the government has given them houses. They used to live on the street, now they have houses with two rooms and a kitchen," said Resham Singh.

Indira Awaas Yojana, which was launched during 1985-86 as a sub scheme of Rural Landless Employment Guarantee Program (RLEGP), is being continued as a sub scheme of Jawahar Rojgar Yojana (JRY) since its launch in April 1989.This scheme was bifurcated in 1996 and separate allocations are now made for it.Indira Awaas Yojna is centrally sponsored scheme and the expenditure is shared by the centre and the State in 80:20 proportion. While, 80 percent of the funds are released by Government of India directly to Zila Parishads, the 20 percent State share is released through District Development and Planning Boards in the state. By Avtar Gill (ANI)