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Gujarat to announce housing policy for quake-affected

The Gujarat government will soon announce a housing policy for the quake-affected people in Kutch, Rajkot and Sundernagar districts and give financial assistance from the consolidated Earthquake Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Fund.

"A policy on the housing front will soon be announced and financial assistance will be provided by the government, which wants NGOs to take a lead role in this regard," Minister of State for Home Haren Pandya told PTI.

Teams from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank will visit the devastated villages next month and are expected to announce grants of huge soft loans to the state for reconstruction, he said.

"The WB and ADB teams will arrive in Ahmedabad on March 12 and visit the affected areas to assess the financial assistance needed," Pandya said.

"They have jointly promised to advance 500 million dollars even before the preliminary damage assessment," he said.

The state government was creating a consolidated fund from the financial assistance received from the central and state governments, foreign countries and various NGOs, which will be utilised to re-build destroyed villages and towns, he said.

Terming the work by several NGOs in the affected areas as "exemplary", Pandya said they will be given the primary role in the reconstruction process. The government will assume a supporting role, he said.

"The priority is to build tent cities, where people can be sheltered," he said adding that the affected areas still needed over 150,000 tents urgently.

Pandya said the preliminary rescue operation is almost complete and added the toll would be somewhere between 30,000-35,000.

Asked how long it would take for the government to provide the remaining tents, he said "We will be able to provide tents for all in another 15 days."

"We have even sent officials to the Kumbh Mela at Allahabad to get tents used by the pilgrims and the response was overwhelming," he said.

Outlining the enormity of the rehabilitation task, the minister said apart from providing shelter to the people, "The government has to build schools, colleges, its own offices, streamline the derailed Public Distribution System, hospitals and other public utility services."

"The total estimated area to be reconstructed is 20 million square feet," he said, adding if one takes the prevailing market rate of construction, this alone would cost the government nothing less than Rs 10 billiob.

PTI

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