The Salia Sahi slum in Bhubaneswar. Pictures by Ashwinee Pati

Bhubaneswar, Oct. 24: The Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) plans to set up housing colonies in public-private-partnership (PPP) mode on around 232 acres of land which is presently occupied by slum dwellers of Salia Sahi and Niladri Vihar.

Part of this land will be used to construct low-cost houses for the relocation of slum-dwellers. The initiative is a part of the BDA’s project for the “Redevelopment of slums in Bhubaneswar in public-private-partnership mode’’.

Salia Sahi, with an area of 215 acre, is the largest slum in the city.

With exploding population and ever decreasing availability of urban land in the capital city, the land reclaimed from these sites may help the development authority in providing better avenues to accommodate more people. But, there are several issues that lie unanswered.

While the engineer in-charge of the project said that apart from publishing the advertisement there was no information with him to elaborate on it, many other officials believed this was only the beginning to include Salia Sahi and Niladri Vihar slums in the redevelopment periphery. “Interested applicants will be asked to come with their own proposals so that the BDA can chose one and apply for the redevelopment exercise,’’ said an official.

Sources in the BDA said that while 1,306 households with a population of 6,107 at Niladri Vihar would have to be rehabilitated, 13,908 households with a population of 68,125 would get the benefits at Salia Sahi.

To prepare a detailed project report (DPR), Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation will carry out a biometric card survey to identify the original residents in both the slums.

Tenders will be floated only after the state government approves the DPR. But, surprisingly, the BDA has not so far started any base-line survey on these two slums.

“A proper survey should have been conducted to know the ground realities as Salia Sahi is the biggest slum in the city. On the other hand, as the redevelopment plan has been prepared following the norms prescribed under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission, the proposed commercial route adopted in the scheme might be violating the guidelines prescribed by the Union ministry of housing and urban poverty alleviation. Before going for the notification, the BDA should have devised a proper model first on their own,’’ said Anup Mohapatra, a senior member of Real Estate Developers Association.

While BDA vice-chairman Deoranjan Kumar Singh said this was the state government’s “independent” project, the developers will provide various models for the development plan.