Boost to housing as DDA gets gram sabha land

The central government has put the gram sabha land of 89 urban villages at the disposal of Delhi Development Authority (DDA) to give an impetus to the land-pooling project, which promises to provide 17 lakh new houses in the capital in the next few years. Senior DDA officials said the land parcels will be used for infrastructure development, including construction of schools, hospitals, community halls, parks, roads, power substations, and other facilities. A gazette notification vesting the land with DDA was made by the Union ministry of housing and urban affairs last week. DDA vice-chairman Tarun Kapoor said the plots will be a part of the general pool of land acquired by the agency over the years and are currently being maintained and managed by it. He added that their first task will be to ascertain the exact volume of land available for carrying out infrastructure development work. Though the policy has been in the offing for several years, it was only in May 2017 that the AamAadmi Party government completed the process and issued the notification to declare these 89 villages as urban, paving way for DDA to plan housing under Master Plan of Delhi 2021.