The New Indian Express | Under PM-UDAY, only 2,500 properties given ownership rights till now in Delhi

Dec 16,2020

The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) has issued conveyance deeds or authorisation slips to about 2,500 properties under the Central government’s ambitious scheme—Pradhan Mantri– Unauthorized Colony in Delhi Awas Adhikar Yojna (PM-UDAY) launched, to grant ownership rights, in December 2019.

As per the data shared by the union housing and urban affairs minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Twitter, total 1,225 conveyance deeds have been executed and authorisation slips for 1,320 properties were handed over till December 11, which jointly make just 0.7 percent of total registration and five percent of the applications received for ownership rights in last one year.    

So far, nearly 3.6 lakh property owners have registered on the DDA’s portal-- launched on December 16 last year--and only 46, 457 of them actually submitted the applications. The agency has rejected more than 4,600 applications.

Given the slow response to PM-UDAY, the authority has decided to rope in the councilors to create awareness and promote the scheme. Anurag Jain, vice chairman of the DDA, said that the authority had taken various measures to motivate property owners such as awareness camps and interactions with resident welfare associations (RWAs).   
“We have organised meetings and also a webinar with 200 RWAs. About 15 days ago, a training workshop was held for the councilors, who will encourage people to take benefits of the scheme. The DDA has already written to the federation of RWAs. We are expecting that the message will go to the people and they will start applying soon. Large number of registrations were done in the beginning and it is true that they didn’t convert into actual applications. However, the number is increasing gradually,” said Jain.  
 
The conveyance deed is executed for the property constructed on public land and in case, it is on private land, the DDA issues an authorisation slip.

The scheme was launched with much fanfare just before the assembly elections in Delhi by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government at the Centre, which was touted as the biggest poll plank.

The government had announced that about 50 lakh residents living in 1,731 unauthorised colonies across the city would be benefitted.

The issue of regularisation of unauthorised colonies had been dominating the elections in the national capital for about two decades.  

According to estimates by various agencies including the DDA, there are about 12.5 lakh residential dwelling units in illegal settlements built on government or agricultural land.

As per the latest figures, a survey of 2.21 lakh properties has been done by GIS agencies and a field survey of 9,331 structures has already been conducted. 

Jain said that because of COVID pandemic, the DDA couldn’t hold camps or a large scale communication programme but had put more manpower to clear the backlog.