A government appointed technical committee estimated urban housing shortage for the 12th five-year plan at 18.78 million homes, which is less than the earlier government estimate of 26.5 million.

   The committee said this at a report submitted recently with the ministry of housing and urban poverty alleviation. In the beginning of the 11th five year plan in 2007, the shortage was 24.7 million. At a press conference, Kumari Selja, minister of housing and urban poverty alleviation, told reporters that the main feature of the technical report on urban housing shortage was that the deficit in housing in such areas had dropped by almost 25 percent from what was expected.

   She said that the addition to the housing stock in the past decade has been more than 26 million homes and the number was arrived at by analyzing household growth, which has seen slower growth, vis-a-vis housing stock which has seen an increase.

   Selja said that this showed that the government’s policies were helping improve the lot of the economically weaker sections (EWS) and helped them climb the social ladder.

   In 2007 the housing shortage for the EWS was almost 88 percent while that for the lower income group (LIG) was 11 percent. As it stands now, the housing shortage for the EWS has gone down to 56 percent and that for LIG is come up to 40 percent. The EWS category, which was most affected earlier has come up, Selja said.