Hyderabad, May 14: In a bid to make Hyderabad a slum-free city, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has decided to either shift or remodel existing slums. Apart from this, slums which lack basic facilities will be provided these facilities.
In a major boost to the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation, the Central government has decided to fund the “Slum Free Hyderabad” project under the Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY) scheme. The GHMC, which had earlier failed to execute the project on its own, has prepared fresh estimates as the Union government is all set to fund the project as part of its overall strategy to make India slum free.
There are 1,472 notified slums in Greater Hyderabad of which 290 will be taken up in the first phase of the Slum Free Hyderabad project.
The project envisages construction of housing units and development of underground drainage, water supply network and connections to individual houses, laying of cement roads, street lighting, community development centres and other civic and transport infrastructure in the slums “at par with the facilities available in other parts of the city”. Of the 295 slums, the civic body has short-listed 70 where housing will be taken up and another 153 slums will be provided with civic infrastructure facilities at an estimated cost of nearly Rs 550 crore in the first phase of the project.
GHMC officials said the entire project is targeted to be completed in five years in five phases, and the total cost of the project is Rs 11,282 crore. Two expert private consultants — Voyants and NCPE Infrastructure India Private Limited — have been awarded the contracts to prepare detailed
project reports for execution of works in the slums.
Housing in some of the slums will be taken up under a Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode. GHMC is seeking the help of Hyderabad district collectorate authorities in identifying the land for housing and the Andhra Pradesh State Housing Board to take up the project on PPP mode. Officials said detailed project reports for 153 slums have been finalised so far and estimates for Rs 545.55 crore have been sent to the state government to be forwarded to the Centre for seeking funds under RAY.
–With Agencies inputs