By Desaraju Surya
HYDERABAD: On the face of it, the Rajiv Swagruha project of the state government looks pretty impressive—making the housing "dreams" of the middle-class people a reality at an affordable cost. The ground reality, however, looks different and the project as such may literally end up as yet another "dream"of the YSR government. Just one factor, the sky-high prices of land in urban areas, may spell doom for the much-hyped programme, many fear. In a far-off municipality like Srikakulam, for example, government land is in short supply and the Andhra Pradesh Housing Board has to necessarily buy land from private owners for taking up the Swagruha project, that too a few kilometres away from the town. With an acre of land commanding anywhere between Rs 50 lakh and Rs one crore, investment on this component alone could make the project unviable. Be it Mangalagiri in Guntur district or Proddutur in Kadapa, land has become a 'priceless' commodity. Examples like this are one too many as the scenario is no different in all the small towns across the state. No special mention needs to made about the big cities like Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada and Guntur, leave alone "Greater" Hyderabad, where a square yard of land is commanding a bare minimum of Rs 25,000. In such a situation, the promise of the government to make the "dream" houses available for 25 per cent less cost than the market rates is impractical to keep. "The Swagruha project too will end up like the previous LIG\MIG housing schemes of the APHB," remarked a senior bureaucrat involved in the project. Failure of the Rajiv Gruhakalpa (RGK) Phase-I should have served as an eye-opener for the government before announcing such a massive project for urban people but "political compulsions"clearly got the better of prudence, he said. In fact, during the recent conference of district collectors, the collectors had highlighted the land problems being faced under the Indiramma and RGK housing projects and kept the chief minister "informed" that the Swagruha project too might come a cropper as it was being taken up in haste. To overcome this problem, the government has decided to build only apartment complexes in six municipal corporations—Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, Guntur, Warangal and Tirupati—while independent houses and integrated townships have been proposed for smaller towns with a population of less than five lakh each. Another deterring factor in the project could be the mounting interest rate on housing loans which at present is around 10 per cent. The government is considering a proposal to "subsidise"the interest rate for non-gazetted officers while others will have no such option.
HYDERABAD: On the face of it, the Rajiv Swagruha project of the state government looks pretty impressive—making the housing "dreams" of the middle-class people a reality at an affordable cost. The ground reality, however, looks different and the project as such may literally end up as yet another "dream"of the YSR government. Just one factor, the sky-high prices of land in urban areas, may spell doom for the much-hyped programme, many fear. In a far-off municipality like Srikakulam, for example, government land is in short supply and the Andhra Pradesh Housing Board has to necessarily buy land from private owners for taking up the Swagruha project, that too a few kilometres away from the town. With an acre of land commanding anywhere between Rs 50 lakh and Rs one crore, investment on this component alone could make the project unviable. Be it Mangalagiri in Guntur district or Proddutur in Kadapa, land has become a 'priceless' commodity. Examples like this are one too many as the scenario is no different in all the small towns across the state. No special mention needs to made about the big cities like Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada and Guntur, leave alone "Greater" Hyderabad, where a square yard of land is commanding a bare minimum of Rs 25,000. In such a situation, the promise of the government to make the "dream" houses available for 25 per cent less cost than the market rates is impractical to keep. "The Swagruha project too will end up like the previous LIG\MIG housing schemes of the APHB," remarked a senior bureaucrat involved in the project. Failure of the Rajiv Gruhakalpa (RGK) Phase-I should have served as an eye-opener for the government before announcing such a massive project for urban people but "political compulsions"clearly got the better of prudence, he said. In fact, during the recent conference of district collectors, the collectors had highlighted the land problems being faced under the Indiramma and RGK housing projects and kept the chief minister "informed" that the Swagruha project too might come a cropper as it was being taken up in haste. To overcome this problem, the government has decided to build only apartment complexes in six municipal corporations—Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada, Guntur, Warangal and Tirupati—while independent houses and integrated townships have been proposed for smaller towns with a population of less than five lakh each. Another deterring factor in the project could be the mounting interest rate on housing loans which at present is around 10 per cent. The government is considering a proposal to "subsidise"the interest rate for non-gazetted officers while others will have no such option.
2 comments:
Hi, I am an applicant of RAJIV SWAGRUHA in Sirilingam palli (Hyderabad zone). I am very much impressed with this project and I had much hopes on my dream home with this project. my application is verified in Oct 2007 and waiting for the next step. Very lately, yesterday (28th Jan) I got to know that, we have to give our priority order among 8 locations given in hyd zone, in any of the e-seva offices. When I approached the Rajiv Swagruha office on this, they said they cannot do any thing on this and your application will not be considered. They Manager said that, you are not the only person who missed giving the priorities, there are 18,000(40%) applicants missed to give. If there is any chance, govt. will give one more notice on this, otherwise you are the opportunity looser.
Anybody know what is the next step on this, if we missed to give our priorities?
I got allotment for Rajivswagruha project at Bachupally. Being in income bracket 20-25,000/- per month I have applied for 3BHK apartment.when prject was launched the market rate was 1200-1500Sft assuming 25% less price over market rate I thought the Goverment rate will be be 900-1125 in that case 3BHK aprtment would cost in between 13.5 to 17 lakhs, which is affordable to persons earning 25,000/month considering he can spent half of the amount to pay EMI. But now the Goverment has declared rate of Rs 36.26 lakhs plus registration and Car parking which will make cost of apartment around 42 lakhs. How this is possible for a person who earns salary of 25,000/- per month to afford a House even if gives all his salary for EMI
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