Rajiv Awas Yojana

Learning from the experience of JNNURM, the Government has announced the bold vision of a Slum-free India through Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY). RAY envisages central support to States that are willing to assign property rights to slum dwellers. RAY would adopt a ‘whole city’, ‘whole slum’ strategy with city as the unit unlike JNNURM which turned out to be a ‘pick and choose’ approach towards slum redevelopment.

RAY would have a two-pronged strategy. The first is to bring the existing slums within the formal system and enable them to avail of the same level of basic amenities as the rest of the town. The second is to undertake measures to prevent the creation of new slums through appropriate urban land policy and restructuring of the master planning model.

There is a dire need to address the issues of faulty urban land policy and urban planning models responsible for mushrooming of slums. Current land policies would need drastic changes to address the interests of the urban poor. The States need to re-look at the policies of making land and living space available to the masses in cities, especially the poor at a much faster rate than the pace of urban population growth.

Community mobilisation and participation in decision-making are also going to be an important element in RAY. RAY would also focus on enabling the urban poor to undertake housing construction and improvement programmes empowered by property right. RAY would also promote private sector participation and public private partnership for creation of affordable housing stock for the Low Income Groups. For all this, the poor will need to be enabled with access to housing and livelihoods finance. 

Excerpts from speech by H'ble Housing & Urban poverty alleviation Min.