'Rent to own' scheme: One of the ways to fix housing deficit in urban areas

All schemes for addressing India's housing shortage zero in on property purchases, but rental housing has not made much headway despite its importance

India has witnessed rapid growth and urbanisation in the last few years, owing to which there has been a considerable rise in the urban population. However, despite the amount of construction and infrastructural developments taking place each day, India is still plagued with an acute housing shortage in urban areas, with a crunching of spaces to accommodate this proliferating mass. To address this problem, the government had set itself the aim of providing housing for all by 2022. Yet sadly, the reality today is no less grim. In comparison to the 3.6 million urban and six million rural housing units