TN’s solar powered green homes ready

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For four-long decades, Subbiah, a 58-year-old agricultural labourer of Manapatty in Pudukkottai, dreamt of living in a concrete house of his own.

Today, he is among 60,000 others in Tamil Nadu who live in a concrete house built in the same place where stood a thatched roof that leaked every time it rained.

He owes it to the state government or rather Chief Minister’s Solar Powered Green House Scheme that turned his dream a reality.

The 60,000 houses promised in the first phase of the scheme implement would be handed over to the beneficiaries this month.

The state rural development (RD) department has set July 27 as deadline for the completion of the first phase of the scheme aimed at providing concrete houses to the homeless families living below poverty line in the state.

Senior RD officials told Deccan Chronicle that about 51,200 houses have been completed thus far, while the remaining 8,000 and odd houses would be completed before the deadline.

In Villupuram district, which houses the maximum number of huts in the state, about 3,760 of the 4,333 houses have been completed till date.

Similarly, 2,295 of the 2,723 green houses have been completed in Cuddalore district followed by Vellore district where only another 430 and odd houses are remaining to achieve the 3,719 target set for the last fiscal.

Roof has been laid for at least 7,000 of the 8,700 remaining houses, officials pointed out adding that identification of 60,000 beneficiaries for the current fiscal has begun and it would be over by the month end.

Tamil Nadu Energy Development Agency would commence the provision of solar power equipment to the houses by month-end and complete the work in a month from then, officials noted.

Beneficiaries are identified at the rate of one per cent STs, 29 per cent SCs and the remaining 70 per cent for BC and others.