Bihar accuses Centre of 'discrimination' for slashing housing

The Bihar government today rued that it was unable to meet the growing demands for shelter by the poor and accused the Centre of discrimination against it by slashing its quota for houses under the Indira Awas Yojana (IAY) for 2014-15.
"We are constrained to meet demand of the poor for houses under the IAY this fiscal due to the Centre's discriminatory attitude," Bihar Rural Development Minister Nitish Mishra said at the Assembly while replying to his department's demand of Rs 6755.85 crore to meet various expenditure in 2014-15.
The Centre has slashed Bihar's quota for houses under the IAY by about 55 per cent for the current fiscal at 2.80 lakh units as against last year's 8.05 lakh units, he said.

Mishra alleged that the slashing of Bihar's quota for housing units under the Central flagship programme has come in stark contrast to the sharp increase in sanction of housing units to states like West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Assam.
Refusing to accept the slashing of the quota Mishra said that he has drawn Union Rural Development Minister Nitin Gadkari's attention about the discrimination.
About the implementation of another the Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) in the state, Mishra said that the scheme has served the right purpose in generating rural employment and assets creation at the grass root level.

The Rural Development department's demand for Rs 6755.85 crore to meet its expenditure for 2014-15 was passed by the house by a voice vote amid walk out by the BJP MLAs.