Odisha Govt to implement housing projects from OMBADC funds

The Odisha government has decided to implement housing, skill development and drinking water schemes from funds available under the Odisha Mineral Bearing Areas Development Corporation (OMBADC).
The Board of Directors meeting of the OMBADC held under the chairmanship of Chief Secretary A P Padhi reviewed the progress of the scheme.
Padhi asked respective departments to follow saturation model in addressing housing and drinking water needs in the mining affected villages.
He also directed officials to prioritise household connection of piped water in those villages.
Though initially 523 villages in the mining areas were covered under the funds, the number later increased to 668 villages following a survey.

Panchyati Raj secretary D R Singh said around 26,409 families in these 668 villages of Angul, Dhenkanal, Jajpur, Jharsuguda, Kendujhar, Koraput, Mayurbhanj and Sundargarh have been identified to be covered under Biju Pucca Ghar Yojana in the first phase.

Each family would get an assistance of Rs 1.2 lakh in plain areas and Rs 1.3 lakh in hilly areas for construction of houses, Singh said adding, so far 18,538 families have been provided the first instalment and 5,346 have been given the second instalment of assistance for construction of houses.
So far, 219 houses have been completed and the rest were in various stages of completion. Rural Development secretary M S Padhi said the tendering process for drinking water supply projects was initiated and it would be expeditiously completed within the scheduled time.

It was decided in the meeting that villages not covered by drinking water projects of MCL would be taken up in the first phase, M S Padhi said.
Skill development training for ST and SC youths have also been taken up under the fund. About Rs 2.4 crore have been provided to ST and SC Development department for the purpose, said department secretary Surendra Kumar, adding that the training would be a residential intensive programme for two years in demand based skills for enhancing employability and productivity of tribal youths.
OMBADC was constituted in compliance with the orders of the Supreme Court as per recommendations of the Central Empowered Committee.

As per its provisions, about 50 per cent of NPV collected from the mining leases would be utilised through this Corporation for basic developmental activities in the identified villages.
So far, Rs 869.42 crore has been received by the Corporation. The Board resolved that the interest earned from the deposit of this corpus would be added with the corpus and would be utilised for the same purpose.