Chief Secretary, Atal Dulloo, today chaired a meeting of Housing & Urban Development Department (H&UDD) to assess the household survey to be carried out by the Department in collaboration with the Planning Development & Monitoring Department for identification of houseless people in J&K.
Those who attended the meeting included Commissioner Secretary, H&UDD; Secretary, Planning; DG, E&S; MD, Housing Board; SIO, NIC and other concerned officers.
The survey would give a detailed idea about the eligible persons to be covered for providing housing units through different programmes under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban) 2.0 PMAY (U) in the UT.
During the meeting, the Chief Secretary emphasised upon the department to frame detailed guidelines for identification of eligible houseless people. He advised to share the same beforehand with all the Deputy Commissioners so that they are able to effectively monitor the process. He directed for working out requirement of manpower for carrying out this survey in urban areas of the UT. He asked to ensure that teachers are exempted from this duty as schools are going to open from March in the valley and board exams are also going on for secondary and higher secondary school students.
He directed for vetting the questionnaire together with the Planning Department so as to pose only relevant questions to the surveyed households and fetch information that is relevant and intended to be significant for this survey.
Dulloo underscored the need for one week training of the surveyors/investigators and building upon the YUVA survey application in order to make this exercise time bound besides cross checking the already collected information. He asked them to complete the survey in the month of March itself so that the process of identification and framing of merit list is accomplished well ahead of the set timeframe.
Dulloo also took note of the methodology of identification process contemplated by the Department.
The Chief Secretary sought suggestions from the Deputy Commissioners and asked about the timeline by which they can complete the exercise. He also had inputs from BISAG-N about the time they need to make necessary changes in the already developed YUVA survey app to make it relevant for this new survey.
Commissioner Secretary, H&UDD, Mandeep Kaur, gave out the details about the significance of this survey to be carried out digitally on the analogy of YUVA survey in all the ULBs of J&K. She made out that this survey is going to provide details of the houseless people which after proper verification process would be framed into a merit list based upon their income and other set criteria.
She further revealed that 1st April 2024 has been fixed as the cut off date by the SLSMC, on which the beneficiaries must be residents of that urban area for being eligible to take benefit under the PMAY (U) 2.0.
Mission Director, PMAY Urban, Ashish Gupta, informed that families belonging to EWS/LIG/MIG segments, living in urban areas, should not own a pucca house (an all-weather dwelling unit) either in his/her name or in the name of any member of his/her family in any part of India to be eligible under this PMAY-U 2.0.
It was further given out that, as per the guidelines of this scheme, EWS households are defined as households with an annual income of up to ?3 lakh. LIG is defined as households with an annual income from ?3-6 lakh and MIG as households with an annual income from ?6-9 lakh. Besides, preference would be given to widows, single women, persons with disabilities, senior citizens, transgenders, persons belonging to SCs/STs, minorities and other weaker and vulnerable sections of the society, the meeting was apprised.
It was also added that special focus would be given to SafaiKarmi, Street Vendors identified under the PMSvanidhi Scheme and different artisans under the Pradhan Mantri-Vishwakarma Scheme, Anganwadi workers, building and other construction workers, residents of slums/chawls and other groups identified during operation of PMAY-U 2.0.
About the base-line survey, it was revealed that it would Identify houseless individuals/families to ensure that the benefits of PMAY-Urban 2.0 reach the section of people who don’t have permanent/ traditional home (kuccha/ pucca/ rental etc.).
This survey is anticipated to begin from 15th of March and enumerate houseless individuals and families in urban areas.
The objective of the survey is to create a comprehensive database for targeted policy interventions besides assessing the eligibility for PMAY-Urban 2.0 and other government welfare schemes. Besides, it will also ensure their inclusion in social welfare and other skill development programs as envisaged from time to time by the government for such a population.