Massive irregularities have come to the fore in the implementation of Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) across Odisha villages.
Allegedly, the names of homeless and deserving people have been dropped from the lists published in various panchayats in Ganjam and Koraput districts. As a result, resentment is brewing among the deprived people throughout these districts.
Residents of several panchayats under Kabisurya Nagar block in Ganjam have come up with the same allegations. Their names have been missing from the final list published recently.
Similar reports have started to emerge from several panchayats under Koraput’s Jeypore block.
Going by their allegations of Kabisurya Nagar residents, they themselves ransacked their huts after concerned panchayat officer informed them that their names have been included under the PMAY scheme. When the final list of beneficiaries was out, they found their names were missing from the list.
“The officer told us specifically to ransack our cottages as our names have been listed under PMAY beneficiaries. It was then we ransacked our houses. However, we were taken aback to know that our names are not in the list. Now we have no roof over our head,” alleged a resident.
Senior journalist Akshay Sahu said, “It’s unfortunate that ineligible people are being given PMAY houses while deserving are being left out. A mechanism should be there to address the issue.”
Similarly, as many as 120 residents of Sukhiaguda under Jeypore block had applied for PMAY houses of which only 12 persons have been allotted the houses.
A deprived resident said, “People with concrete houses have their names in the list. But we don’t have. We have been urging the government for the last five years to allocate us houses, but every time government removed our names from the beneficiary list.”
Reported by T Gouri Shanker, Pitabas Das, OTV