Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna- Urban (PMAY-U) under which several people of the country are promised houses, ‘succumbs’ to data manipulation. Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs’ Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee (CSMC) held many meetings with the states where PMAY-U is implemented, and in its 54th meeting, CSMC snapped several States on their failure. PMAY-U has several entities under which States first sent a huge number of beneficiaries to the Central government and then back out mentioning a different set of excuses— beneficiaries not interested, land not suitable or found, and so on.
Haryana government proposed before the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs to surrender 1,30,879 houses and curtailment of 70,534 houses in 19 Affordable Housing in Partnership (AHP) projects. It is mentioned in the meeting report that Haryana has been unable to spend Rs 405 crore under PMAY-U. Moreover, in the last several years the Haryana government has been incompetent to start 82 sanctioned AHP and In-Situ Slum Redevelopment (ISSR) projects.
The committee even found that the Haryana was unable in executing Beneficiary-Led Individual House Construction or enhancement (BLC) projects as well where they were released with funds to complete 47,116 houses but they completed only 4459 houses against 67411 houses under the BLC verticle.
Similarly, in Himachal Pradesh, the state has asked the committee to curtail 1987 houses out of 7,547 houses under 82 BLC projects as beneficiaries are found to have shifted to some other states. The Himachal government, hence, has been unable to spend Rs 42.72 Crore under PMAY-U and the utilisation certificate of Rs 30.05 Crore is still pending.
Bihar government has asked the committee for curtailment of 6740 houses under 31 BLC projects due to the non-availability of suitable land in the state. The Bihar state has an unspent budget of Rs 1034.83 Crore under PMAY-U.
Uttar Pradesh government told the committee that the prior submission of beneficiaries was never made by them so the committee shall cancel the housing projects— 58,099 houses under BLC were reportedly cancelled.
In Madhya Pradesh, 14,310 houses have been curtailed/surrendered under 114 BLC projects saying that the beneficiaries have migrated, or that the beneficiaries were wrongly attached. MP has an unspent budget of Rs 1905.04 Crore under PMAY-U.
Karnataka government has asked the committee to cancel 31293 houses under 49 AHP projects, 8728 houses under 10 AHP projects, 627 houses under 7 BLC projects, 5734 houses under 85 BLC projects giving the reason that the beneficiaries have migrated to some other states. Gujarat, similarly, canceled 17181 houses under 15 AHP projects and curtailed 1256 EWS houses under 5 AHP projects.