KARACHI, Jan 17: The Sindh Katchi Abadis Authority (SKAA) is actively considering setting up of more residential colonies in Sindh for low-income groups on the pattern of “Khuda Ki Basti”.
Stating this in his office on Thursday, the SKAA’s director- general, Tasneem Ahmed Siddiqui, told newsmen that the proposed residential schemes would be financed with the authority’s reserve fund of Rs 100 million.
Besides, president General Pervez Musharraf has also asked the Sindh Government to provide Rs 50 million to the SKAA for its revolving fund and this amount would also be utilised towards the low-cost housing schemes of the SKAA.
He said a survey would be initiated for locating the affordable land in various parts of the province and after carrying out planning, new schemes would be launched.
About the SKAA’s “Khuda Ki Basti”, which is located about 25 kilometre at the city’s Taiser Town and is meant for the low- income groups, he said there were in all 1,785 housing units in the Basti and each plot measuring 80 square yards costs Rs 37,000.
Of these plots, 1,300 have already been allotted in the scheme by adopting a transparent system of allotment, he said, adding arrangements have also been made for provision of consultant and adviser as well as for providing necessary facilities.
And as far as provision of electricity in the Basti is concerned, he said negotiations were under way with the KESC for providing electricity at affordable rates.
Asked if the katchi abadis have become subject of the city government following the promulgation of SLGO-2001, he said although the Katchi Abadis was a function of district governments under the devolution plan, ways and means for transferring Katchi Abadis have not been clearly spelled out in the Ordinance and hence some amendments aimed at incorporating Sindh Katchi Abadis Act, 1987 were required so that the functioning of the SKAA was not disturbed.
In fact, the task of surveying katchi abadis and its amelioration plans should be undertaken at town levels and the process of awarding lease of katchi abadis be handled by the Sindh Local government department where a cell could be set up for the purpose, he opined.
At the outset, he said there were 1,151 regularisable katchi abadis in Sindh and of them, 929 have been notified, so far, while the ownership rights had been given in 702 katchi abadis.
Tracing the history of the SKAA, he said that the Authority had started functioning in 1991 on self-finance basis and had been meeting the authority’s expenses, katchi abadis’ development and cost of land through the lease money.
Highlighting the problems being faced by the SKAA, he said that the acquisition of no-objection certificates (NOC) for the federal government land is a herculean task as compared to that of the provincial government land.
Replying to a question, he pointed out that the SKAA had undertaken development work from its own resources in some 90 katchi abadis.
He said that the trend of illegal katchi abadis could be checked effectively only by launching more and more housing schemes for low-income groups and plots and house building loans are provided to them on easy instalments.
He said that it is the duty of government to help provide land for residential purpose to low-income group or else the trend of setting up katchi abadis will continue to flourish.
Disclosing that there were over 200,000 vacant plots in the city which the people had bought a number of years back for either market speculation or investment purpose, he said since the fine for not constructing houses within certain period is quite nominal, those possessing plots never take an interest in constructing houses on their plots.
He hoped that the proposed Urban Land Disposal Ordinance which the government would promulgate in a week would ensure provision of residential plots to low-income groups on easy terms and conditions, besides discouraging the trend of acquiring plots for investment purposes.