Kalyannagar stalemate diluted, VMC to pay rent to oustees

VADODARA: The stalemate over the Kalyannagar slum rehabilitation diluted to some extent with the Vadodara Municipal Corporation (VMC) deciding to resume rent to families ousted from the slums. Activists including professor J S Bandukwala had refused to leave the VMC headquarters on Friday night and did so after the promise regarding the rent was made just before midnight.
The civic body had promised the Kalyannagar families that it would construct houses for them at the site itself, but has decided against doing so later as unauthorised extra work led to exhaustion of funds. The Kalyannagar settlement that had around 1,900 dwellings was razed by the civic body in 2014. Some of the resident of Kalyannagar were given residences in Kalyannagar and Kalali. But the resettlement at Sayajipura and Kalali was objected by locales as most of the residents of Kalyannagar were from the minority community.
Later the VMC, in a settlement reached with those who were ousted after a razing drive, had promised that those who were not being allowed to settle in housing schemes at Sayajipura and Kalali by local residents would be given houses at Kalyannagar itself. The residents, however, find themselves in a piquant condition as the civic body has defaulted on rent for around seven months even as there is no progress on the housing scheme proposed there. As many as 618 families are to be paid a rent of Rs 3,000 a month till the housing scheme comes up at Kalyannagar.
VMC commissioner Vinod Rao said that the civic body would pay the rents immediately. He added that talks would be held with representatives of the Kalyannagar beneficiaries next week. “They need to understand that we are not in a position to spend more on the project,” said Rao.