Fifty-five-year-old Shivaji Sada of Shahid Nagar in Dhanusha is overjoyed to get a permanent home. He had been living with six members of his family in a thatched-roof house since many years.
Sada said that he had never imagined that he would be able to sleep in a cemented house in his lifetime. But he is now elated to get a concrete house through the Janata Awas (or people’s housing) programme run by the government. “Now I need not worry about a house, I can only concentrate on feeding my family,” he said.
Likewise, Asarfi Sada of Gaushala Municipality of Mahottari, did not believe that he would become the owner of a concrete house. But he is also happy to have a permanent home under the people’s housing program. “We had been living in thatched huts since many years, but finally we are able to live in a concrete building” he said. He is confident that this will solve the problem of homelessness that he has been suffering from for years.
Like Shivaji and Asarfi, more than 3,000 Dalit and destitute families in Dhanusha, Mahottari and Sarlahi have got concrete buildings under the people’s housing program. Dalit poor families who had been living a miserable life in thatched hut are happy to get a permanent structure as their home.
Under the People’s Housing Program, from the fiscal year 2072/73 to the fiscal year 2077/78, 795 people from Dhanusha, 1,560 from Mahottari and 2,370 from Sarlahi have signed agreements for the construction of permanent house. According to the Urban Development and Building Office, Janakpur, out of them, 506 from Dhanusha, 1,058 from Mahottari and 1,670 from Sarlahi have got concrete buildings in place of their thatched-roof houses.
According to Binod Kumar Yadav, head of the Urban Development and Building Office, Janakpur, 375 poor families in Dhanusha, 507 in Mahottari and 898 in Sarlahi have been provided with permanent houses from the federal government’s budget in the last fiscal year 2076/77. According to him, in the fiscal year 2075/76, 131 poor families in Dhanusha, 251 in Mahottari and 443 in Sarlahi have been provided with permanent housing. Similarly, 281 houses in Dhanusha, 502 in Mahottari and 700 in Sarlahi are under construction for 1,491 poor families, said Chief Yadav.
Chief Yadav shared that the construction of 71 residential buildings in Dhanusha in the fiscal year 2077/78 BS could not be completed due to the risk of Corana virus infection. The government has allocated Rs. 332,500 per house for a two-room concrete building with a veranda. In addition, an additional Rs 15,000 has been allocated for the construction of toilets along with the house, said Yadav.
People’s housing program is being implemented in Dhanusha, Mahottari and Sarlahi districts from the fiscal year 2066-77 as per the government’s plan to provide housing to the extremely poor and Dalit community members. While the federal government had been operating the public housing program until FY 2073/74, the provincial governments have been continuing the program since FY 2074/75.
