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Minister for Urban Employment and Poverty Alleviation Kumari Selja announced that HUDCO has earmarked a sum of Rs. 2000 crores, which will be made available for lending related to the construction and rehabilitation works in the Tsunami affected areas.
Speaking to the media persons after receiving the dividend cheques from HUDCO here today, Kumari Selja further stated that a special loan scheme of HUDCO would be floated with immediate effect for the repairs, retrofitting and reconstruction of new houses for the economically weaker sections at a highly subsidized interest rate of upto 6.5% for the calamity affected regions.
This is against 7.5% presently applicable for EWS Schemes, which itself is among the lowest lending rates offered by any lending institution for economically weaker section category, she added. The Minister further informed that HUDCO has contributed Rs. One crore to the Prime Minister’s Relief Fund, and also earmarked additional Rs. One crore for construction of relief shelters with disaster resistant technologies, through Building Centers.
Stating that HUDCO has responded spontaneously to reach out to the people affected by the devastation caused by the Tsunami, the Minister assured that “HUDCO’s past experiences in supporting rehabilitation projects in disaster hit areas will be effectively utilized to combat the current situation”.
Kumari Selja said that HUDCO is already in touch with the State Governments through its network of Regional Offices assessing the damage caused and extending all support for rehabilitation of the affected population.
The Minister indicated that the Building Centres located near the affected areas would step in to provide technical guidelines and training for reconstruction of the affected houses in a cost-effective manner. The network of Building Centres promoted and supported by HUDCO throughout the country provide aesthetic, innovative, durable, cost effective and alternate building technologies utilizing locally available material and technical know-how.
The Minister received the dividend cheques from HUDCO of over Rs.102 crores for the year 2003-04 and also as interim dividend for the current year. The total payment comprises of Rs. 66.49 Crores as dividend for the year 2003-2004 wherein HUDCO earned a net profit of Rs. 332.44 crores as against Rs. 266.54 crores last year. The dividend would be payable to the Ministry of Urban Employment & Poverty Alleviation, Ministry of Urban Development and the Ministry of Rural Development in proportion to their equity contributions. The dividend paid also included the interim dividend declared by HUDCO for the current financial year 2004-2005 amounting to Rs. 35.68 crores. She highlighted the fact that HUDCO has been able to maintain its focus on the EWS and LIG and still achieve higher profitability.
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