Odisha govt to provide land, property rights to slum dwellers

Highlights

• Land rights to be granted to slum dwellers in NACs and municipal areas
• Property rights to be provided to slum dwellers in municipal corporation areas

Bhubaneswar: The Odisha cabinet on Tuesday approved a proposal to grant land and property rights to slum dwellers in urban areas of the state.

The cabinet approved the promulgation of two ordinances for conferment of land rights to people living in slums in Notified Area Councils (NACs) and Municipalities of the state and property rights to those living in Municipal Corporation areas.

We have taken a historic decision today to grant land rights to the slum dwellers living in municipal councils and NACs of the state and property rights to those living in municipal corporation areas – Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik

Under the Odisha Land Rights to Slum Dwellers Ordinance-2017, land rights shall be settled with landless slum dwellers in municipalities and NACs by the government.

While land up to 30 square metres shall be settled free of cost, land in excess 30 square metre subject to maximum limit of 60 square metre in NACs and 40 square metre in municipal council area shall be settled at a percentage of the benchmark value of the land, chief secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi told media persons.

The urban poor will get land rights for residential use that are ‘heritable, mortgageable and non-transferable’. As far as possible, efforts will be made to provide these rights on an ‘in situ’ basis.

Limited transferable rights will be given in Corporation areas, said Padhi.