[mpisgmedia] JNNURM digest

*Urban poor housing schemes run into class barriers* *Ayesha
Khan*<http://www.expressindia.com/about/feedback.html?mailto=easwaran@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

*Vadodara, March 15:* Even as Vadodara Municipal Corporation (VMC) begins
the work of receiving applications for urban poor housing under the National
Urban Renewal Mission (NURM), resistance over such homes in many
neighbourhoods could queer the pitch for the civic body as well as the urban
poor. Following a reply to an application filed under the Right to
Information Act (RTI) Act on the issue, VMC admitted that it could not build
houses under the Valmiki Ambedkar Awas Yojna (VAMBAY) in Bapod and
Danteshwar due to local opposition. Though land has been allotted as per the
law, the civic body cannot go ahead with the construction of 882 houses in
these two areas because of opposition from the residents.

It is definitely not the first time that people from middle-class or upper
middle class neighbourhoods have made a representation against the presence
of urban poor housing schemes in their vicinity. Maya Valecha, one of the
activists who had been rallying for the rights of evicted slum dwellers to a
proper home, said, "This is bad scenario, a ghettoisation of a worrying
kind, wherein the rich and the poor cannot live together because the rich
don't want them nearby."

It was in reply to her query under the RTI Act, where she had sought
details about the houses that have been built in the city and allotted under
various schemes for the urban poor, that VMC executive engineer (housing)
explained why houses could not be built under VAMBAY in Danteshwar and
Bapod. Earlier, residents in New Sama Road as well as Karelibaugh had
objected to the housing scheme that was to come up on civic plots, as they
feared that the real estate value of properties would be lowered. Worse
still, some also feared that the presence of the urban poor, though housed
in proper buildings, will not be in sync with the middle class or upper
middle class neighbourhoods.

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