Rajiv Awas Yojana to get cabinet nod

Over one-and-a-half year after it was announced, Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY) - the UPA government's flagship programme to make slum free, looks finally set for a take off.

Over one-and-a-half year after it was announced, Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY) - the UPA government's flagship programme to make slum free, looks finally set for a take off.

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India's urban slum population is expected to touch 93.06 million by 2011 from 75.26 million in 2001.

The programme is likely to be taken up by the union cabinet in February.

Officials in the housing and urban poverty alleviation ministry (HUPA) - the nodal ministry to implement the programme - said that a cabinet note on RAY has already been circulated.

"Once we get the green signal from the cabinet, we will start the process of implementing it in a phase manner," said a ministry official.

Housing minister Kumari Selja also met the Prime Minister on February 4 to apprise him on the ministry's preparations on RAY.

The slum free programme has been hit by a series of delays ever since President Pratibha Patil, while addressing the joint session of Parliament in June 2009, announced the government's ambition vision to make India slum free in five years.

Last year, the government's Expenditure and Finance Committee (EFC) where the scheme was sent for approval, while approving Rs 5,000 crore for RAY in the 11th Plan (till 2012) failed to specify the financing pattern - the contribution of the center and the state in the scheme.