PM Modi chairs Union Cabinet meeting; clears 30 million more houses for poor under PM Awas Yojana

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday chaired his first Union Cabinet meeting after taking the oath as PM of his third term and decided to provide assistance to 3 crore additional rural and urban households for the construction of houses under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY).

It has been decided in the Union Cabinet meeting today to provide assistance to 3 crore additional rural and urban households for the construction of houses, to meet the housing requirements arising out of the increase in the number of eligible families.

The decision is in response to the growing number of families that qualify for housing assistance. The government has been implementing the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana since 2015-16 to provide assistance to eligible rural and urban households for the construction of houses with basic amenities. Under PMAY, a total of 4.21 crore houses have been completed for eligible poor families under the housing schemes in the last 10 years.

All the houses constructed under PMAY are provided with other basic amenities such as household toilets, LPG connections, electricity connections, functional household tap connections, etc. through convergence with other schemes of the central government and the State governments.

The Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban) Mission was launched in June 2015, intending to provide housing for all in urban areas by the year 2022. In August 2022, the Union Cabinet approved the continuation of PMAY-U up to December 31, 2024, with all verticals except the Credit Linked Subsidy Scheme (CLSS), for the completion of already sanctioned houses until March 31, 2022.

It is one of the major flagship programmes being implemented by the Government of India under the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA)