PM to hand over 32,904 houses to homeless families as Eid gifts

A total of 32,904 landless, homeless and marginalised poor families in the country are set to receive houses on Tuesday as gifts from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on the occasion of the Eid-ul-Fitr.

Each family will get a semi-pucca house with two decimals of land, said senior secretary to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) Md Tofazzal Hossain Mia at a press briefing on Sunday (24 April). 

In the third phase of the Ashrayan-2 project of the Prime Minister's Office, the houses will be handed over across four project areas in Dhaka, Barishal, Rajshahi and Chattogram.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will hand over the houses at a virtual ceremony connecting with Poradia, Khajurtola, Khokshabari and Hajigaon Ashrayan Projects.

A total of 1,17,321 families got houses in the first two phases of the Ashrayan project. For the third phase, the construction of 65,674 single houses is underway, said the PMO Secretary.

He also told the briefing that the government has spent Tk2,59,500 for the construction of each house in the third phase. Adding the price of two decimal land given to the landless along with the house, its value in some areas will exceed one crore taka.

So far, 5512 acres of government land has been freed from influential land grabbers from all over the country, with a market value of around Tk 3,000 crore.

"The Prime Minister has instructed us to buy land and build houses in areas where the government does not have land," he said and added that so far, 168 acres of land has been purchased across the country under the Ashrayan project at a cost of Taka 115.33 crore.

Tofazzal Hossain said that the number of landless and homeless people in the country is 2.69 lakh and the number of families who have land but no house is 8 lakh.

He also said that the prime minister has approved the design of portable houses for the homeless in the char areas so that they can move their abode in the event of flood or river erosion.

For people living in hill areas, Tong – traditional hill houses – houses have been built with locally collected material and designs of their choice.

The government has allocated Tk 3,972 crore for the construction of 1,83,003 houses in the current fiscal year.

In the year after independence, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman visited Charporagachha village in Ramgati upazila of today's Lakshmipur district and directed to rehabilitate the landless and homeless.

In 1997, the Prime Minister took up the Ashrayan project to rehabilitate the coastal people of Cox's Bazar who became homeless during the cyclone.

A total of 5,07,244 landless and homeless families have been rehabilitated under this project from 1997 to last March.

In response to a question from The Business Standard, Tofazzal Hossain said that houses are being provided to the landless and homeless people in the government database.

"The government will take similar measures in the future for people who may become homeless due to natural calamities," he added.