‘Scope for getting 20,000 houses under RAY for city'

VIJAYAWADA: There was scope of constructing 20,000 houses under the Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY) in Vijayawada city, Chief Minister N.Kiran Kumar Reddy, has said.

Addressing beneficiaries who were allotted 1,056 housing units in the JNNURM housing facility at Disney Land here on Tuesday the Chief Minister said that the Congress party had promised housing for the poor in the 2004 election manifesto and it planned to make Andhra Pradesh a “hut-less” State by constructing the required 40 lakh housing units.

But over the years the number of housing units being constructed by the State Government had increased to 86.75 lakh and out of the houses being built, 51 lakh housing units had already been completed and the rest were in different stages of construction.

The Government had sanctioned construction of 28,000 housing units in Vijayawada city. Land could be secured for 18,000 housing units till now and land needed to be found for the construction of the remaining 10,000 housing units. He said the State Government would not object to any kind of arrangement for the acquisition of land for the building of the remaining 10,000 housing units.

Vijayawada Central MLA Malladi Vishnu said that the housing schemes had transformed the area where nothing existed till as recent as 2009. He said the State Government had sanctioned a junior college and a Railway Playground was also going to be developed. There was however a need for two police stations in the area.

Secondary Education Minister K. Parthasarathi said the political parties that were saying that there was no development in the city were blind and deaf.

He said the Left Parties that were at the helm of affairs for some time should ask themselves what they had achieved in their regime. He said that he lived in an apartment in Hyderabad, but the infrastructure being provided to the beneficiaries that have been allotted under JNNURM housing was even better.

Vijayawada MP Lagadapati Rajagopal, . Mines and Geology Minister Galla Aruna Kumari and others spoke.