The Government would soon launch a National Housing Mission to work towards the ambitious initiative ‘housing for all by 2022’, said M Venkaiah Naidu, Union Urban Development Minister, on Friday.

“We have experience of JNNURM, Indira Awaas Yojana, Rajiv Awaas Yojana, apart from Rajiv Rinn Yojana, which did not take off despite best efforts. I have studied all these schemes. The Government has decided to merge all these schemes and bring one National Housing Mission,” Naidu added.

The mission is in advanced stages of finalisation, he said, adding that the Ministry was also working towards a scheme for interest subvention for the urban poor. The Minister was speaking at the annual conclave of the National Real Estate Development Council here. The Government believes in public-private partnership and will involve the private sector in the mammoth task of constructing houses, Naidu added.

At the conclave, the real estate body came out with a wishlist for the sector which included infrastructure status to housing, single window clearance, online clearance, and simplifying procedures.

In order to get adequate credit for the housing sector, Naidu said that he will pursue with the Finance Minister to ensure priority lending for housing so that the sector gets enough resources to promote affordable housing.

Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said he had started simplifying the process of clearances. “Permissions for projects up to 40 hectares can now be given at the State and city levels,” he said.

Due diligence is on for the request to raise environment exemption limit to 50,000 sq m, Javadekar added.

According to estimates, there is a shortage of 19 million houses currently which is expected to rise to 30 million houses by 2022.

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