HYDERABAD: Construction of two-bedroom houses, one of the flagship programmes of chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, seems to have finally taken off with tenders for 41,925 units having been finalized for this fiscal.
As many as 1,629 houses have already been constructed and work on 20,986 houses has begun. Though the achievement statistics are not much to boast of, officials of the housing department are upbeat that at least now contractors are coming forward to execute the project.
According to sources, contractors had been hesitant after the government rejected their “main demand” to enhance construction cost from Rs 1,250 per sq feet to Rs 1,500 per sq ft in Greater Hyderabad and from Rs 900 sft to Rs 950 sft in rural areas. But the intervention by elected representatives seems to have effected the change.
“While the ministers want to show their performance on the housing front in their districts to the CM, the MLAs want to be in the good books of the ministers and complete the housing units before the 2019 polls with an eye on votes. Contractors also know they stand to get other government projects if they participate now,” sources said.
But despite this momentum, the scheme is far from achieving the target set by KCR, who wants 2.33 lakh houses constructed in the 2017-18 fiscal at the rate of 1,400 units in each of the 95 Assembly constituencies (excluding Greater Hyderabad) and one lakh units in the GHMC limits.
