NEW DELHI, March 8- Indian Minister for Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation Ajay Maken(Pic) said Thursday that some 530,000 families in India are homeless, Press Trust of India (PTI) reported. In his response during question time at the Upper House of India’s Parliament, Maken said that an internal committee of the ministry has calculated that there is a shortage of 18.78 million houses in India.
“Of these, 14.99 million are due to congestion and the remaining 530,000 are due to homeless families,” he noted.
“The census figures of 2011 show that in total we have 78.87 million households in the country while there are only 78.48 million houses.
“This means that there is a shortage of 390,000 houses in the entire urban area, which is just 0.5 per cent,” he said. He however noted that the shortage has decreased from the three per cent recorded in 2001 due to government policies both at the Central and State levels.
BERNAMA
