The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Scheme to provide houses for resettled residents yet to take off

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Monday, Jan 14, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Scheme to provide houses for resettled residents yet to take off

K. Manikandan

Panchayat unable to build houses as Mylai Balaji Nagar residents do not own land

— Photo: K. Manikandan

UNHEALTHY SURROUNDINGS: The area around the community hall in Mylai Balaji Nagar, Pallikaranai.

TAMBARAM: A government-funded scheme to provide alternative accommodation to 2,200 families, evicted several years ago to make way for the Mass Rapid Transit System, at Mylai Balaji Nagar in Pallikaranai Town Panchayat, remains a non-starter.

A section of the residents have been offered a Rs.4.79-crore scheme that will provide them an individual house, protected water, cement-topped roads and streetlights. But, it is unlikely that it will take off soon.

The families who lived in Mylapore for several generations were resettled here about 12 years ago. The Pallikaranai Town Panchayat is unable to build houses for them under a Central scheme as they do not own the land.

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation has been implementing Basic Services for Urban Poor through the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission.

The objective is to build individual houses with attached toilet and bath and provide basic amenities to the locality.

The cost of each house will be Rs.80,000, with contributions from the Central and State governments and a part from the beneficiary, who should possess ownership of land.

The Pallikaranai Town Panchayat was selected under BSUP and 396 families in Mylai Balaji Nagar were chosen as beneficiaries. A recent survey revealed that only 119 of them were residing in the locality now.

The condition after resettlement was that families should pay Rs.300 a month for 80 months.

Enquiries revealed that of the original 2,202 families, only half continued to stay there, while the rest had “sold” their plots for meagre amounts and migrated. Further, neither the original occupants nor the new owners have paid up the amount due to the Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board, which had taken a loan to develop the locality.

As none of them had paid the amount, the TNSCB did not hand over possession of plots. Recently, Tambaram MLA S.R. Raja made it clear to residents that unless they paid the deposit due to the TNSCB, it would not be possible to improve living conditions in the locality.

P. Vivek, a resident, said problems concerning inadequate toilet facilities, erratic water supply, poor roads and lack of streetlights were never addressed.

Town Panchayat authorities said efforts to develop the locality always evoked hostile reactions from a small section. Even recently, they had carried out basic repair work to the tune of Rs.5 lakh, but the newly laid water lines were damaged. The community hall was built at a cost of Rs.14 lakh, but miscreants ensured that none could use it, officials said.

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