Venkaiah Naidu to finalise action plan on shelters for urban homeless

New Delhi, Nov 20: The Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation has convened a meeting of chief secretaries of all states and union territories tomorrow to discuss their action plans regarding provision of temporary and permanent shelters for homeless in urban areas.

This meeting has been convened in pursuance of the direction of the Supreme Court in the matter of a PIL regarding shelters for homeless. The apex court on November 13 had directed the HUPA Ministry to convene such a meeting within ten days for taking stock of availability of shelters and file an affidavit within three weeks, on the way forward.

The direction of the Supreme Court came further to the filing of affidavits by some states and union territories in the matter where in the Court sought a detailed response from the HUPA Ministry.

According to a senior HUPA Ministry official, the meeting will discuss the number of people in states/UTs, number of temporary and permanent shelters available, future plans for construction and improvement of shelters and the steps taken by states/UTs to implement the Scheme of Shelters for Urban Homeless under National Urban Livelihood Mission.

After eliciting the responses of states and UTs in the matter of night shelters, Minister of Urban Development and HUPA Venkaiah Naidu will hold a day-long session with the chief secretaries to discuss various initiatives of the Centre pertaining to building of smart cities, provision of basic infrastructure in 500 urban areas, development of heritage cities, Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana (DAY) and Housing for all Urban Poor by 2022 besides issues relating to urban governance, urban reforms and capacity building.

PTI