Andhra Pradesh Govt to borrow Rs 5000 crore to buy land for the poor

The Andhra Pradesh State Government will be borrowing Rs 5000 crore from Housing and Urban Development Corporation Ltd (HUDCO) to acquire housing sites for the poor. As per reports, the public sector company will be lending the money to the State Government for the purchase of 12,000 acres of land, which will be distributed to the landless poor in Andhra Pradesh.

The Andhra Pradesh State Government had earlier announced that house sites and housing units will be distributed to 25 lakh beneficiaries on 25 March, marking the auspicious occasion of Ugadi.

While it has been estimated by the officials that about 40,000 acres of land will be needed for the distribution, 27,000 acres have already been identified across the State. The remaining land will have to be purchased from private individuals.

It has also been reported that lands earmarked for industrial purposes, in some districts, will be converted to housing sites as there has been little progress on the industrial front over the past few years.

“We will have to purchase about 12,000 acres from farmers and other landlords while another 3,000 acres will be secured under a land pooling scheme. To purchase the land, we require about Rs 5,000 crore and the Housing and Urban Development Corporation Ltd (HUDCO) has agreed to lend the money,” a Revenue Department official was quoted as saying by PTI.

Treating the scheme as a housing project, the State Government is even known to have approached LIC Housing Finance for obtaining funds for the same.