Area set aside in Ahmedabad for PM's affordable housing scheme 'has gone to big builders'

Following my article on affordable housing in Counterview, which quoted a top real estate consultant, I was informed that affordable housing—a scheme introduced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi—has deviated from its original intent. A former senior bureaucrat, whom I used to meet during my Sachivalaya days, told me that an entire area in Ahmedabad, designated for the scheme, has been used to construct costly houses instead.

The area, Shela, located off Ahmedabad on the way to Sanand, is now filled with "multi-storey buildings," which was not what the Modi scheme, called Prime Minister Awas Yojna (Urban), had envisioned. The area has what are called 3 and 4 bedroom luxurious apartments, whatever that may mean.

"One of my acquaintances, who lived in a dilapidated housing society built decades ago, sold his house for ₹40 lakh, added more than ₹30 lakh, and bought a flat in Shela," he told me. "The flat is 80 square meters in area, but after deducting 40% for super built-up space, it has three bedrooms. Compared to the floor space index (FSI) of 1.5 for affordable housing, the apartments being built here have an FSI of 4.0." The consultant I quoted emphasized that affordable housing should cost a maximum of ₹40 lakh.

Meanwhile, in another reaction to my piece, Mansee Bal Bhargava, a town planning consultant, remarked that affordable housing has already become a thing of the past. She pointed out that the entire Dharavi slum area in Mumbai, the largest in Asia, has been "handed over to the Ambanis."

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Jay Somnath

Kanhaiyalal Maneklal Munshi This is what happened several decades ago, when I was a small school-going child. Every summer, accompanied with my mother, I would come down from Delhi to spend the two-month-long holiday at my maternal uncle’s place in the posh Panchvati area of Ahmedabad. Each weekend, my uncle would take us for a ride in his grand old black car. I think it was Chevrolet. I would wait eagerly for the weekend, as I had virtually nothing to do for the rest of the days. In the evenings, I mostly play in the open ground with the neighbouring children, but for rest of the time, as if, I was under strict, almost loving, control of my grandma, whom all of the children of the family called Baa. Especially after the dinner, which would be pretty early, she would make it a point to entertain us – mainly me and my cousin – by playing bezique. During one such summer, Baa decided to give us a strong injection of nationalism. She took in her hand Kanhaiyalal Maneklal Munshi’s well-kno...

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