Slum-dwellers: Give us grants, will build houses ourselves

By Hamsaveni N.

Sufferingbecause houses meant for them are half constructed, slum-dwellers on Tuesday demanded that money earmarked for their homes be sent directly to each of their bank accounts.

Slum Janandolana-Karnataka, a forum of urban deprived communities, said slum-dwellers should be given the option to build their houses by providing grants under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.

Narasimhamurthy A, state convener of the Slum Janandolana organization, informed The Observer: “The housing scheme has turned a burden for people living in slums. The houses are left half constructed. We… are forced to stay in rented houses. Let the grants released by the government transferred directly into beneficiaries’ accounts. We will construct our houses by ourselves; we don’t want any contractor to be involved.”

According to a survey conducted by the Karnataka Slum Board, there are 2,804 slums in state. Out of these, 597 are in Bengaluru city. The state’s slum population is estimated to be about 40.50 lakh – 22.56 per cent of the urban population. In all, 2,397 slums are notified in the state, out of which 387 are notified in Bengaluru under the Karnataka Slum Areas (Im- provement and Clearance) Act, in the year 1973.

Sashidar Aradhya from Ullal Upanagara explained that under his assembly constituency, a total of 400 houses were sanctioned, of which 360 houses are partially constructed. The houses were sanctioned under PMAY in the year 2017.

Kenchappa, a slum-dweller from Ullal Upanagara said: “My sheet house was demolished six years ago in the name of new house. I currently live in a rented house by paying Rs 4000