DINAJPUR: Land Minister Shamsur Rahman Sherif yesterday said the government has taken initiatives to rehabilitate 2.5 lakh destitute people of 50 thousand homeless families in the next three years, reports BSS. "At least 800 homeless families would be rehabilitated through providing shelters and land . . . as per the directive of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, the government is rehabilitating homeless people under Ashrayan project creating cluster village with power connections," he said.
The minister was addressing as chief guest at a function after the inauguration of 30 homeless families' (150 persons) rehabilitation under Cluster Village-1 (Guchchha Gram-1) at Bangla Hili under Hakimpur upazila in the district.
Sherif said the government has targeted to alleviate poverty permanently of 1.10 crore underprivileged people of the entire country so that it would rehabilitate all homeless people across the country as well as develop their socio-economic condition. He said with the rehabilitation of 150 persons of 30 families, the programme began its journey.
"Under Cluster Village-2 level, every homeless family will get two-room house having 300 square-feet floor space with RCC (Reinforced concrete column), tube-well of pure drinking water, sanitary latrine of five rings and multipurpose community hall," he said.
He said micro-credit and training on income-generation would also be provided to cluster village residents through Bangladesh Rural Development Board.
"Taka 258.29 crore has been allocated this year to rehabilitate 10,000 homeless families but Taka 960 crore has been fixed as a cost of rehabilitating more 50 thousand families within next three years," he said.
A beneficiary of rehabilitation programme, Abdur Rouf expressed his reaction saying that Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman wanted to manage shelter and lands to homeless and landless people like them and now his daughter Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is materializing his father's pledge. "Now we would not have to live our livelihood as homeless and landless . . .we have our own shelter . .we are very happy," he said.
Chaired by Cluster Village Project National Project Director M Mahbub-ul-Alam, the function was joined by Dinajpur-6 seat lawmaker Shibli Sadik, among others.
The present government has created 254 cluster village to rehabilitate 10,703 homeless families in 61 districts in the last five years as well as 247 multipurpose halls were constructed to impart training and run income-generating activities. Some 11,000 youths in 254 cluster villages received training and Tk 11 crore microcredit through BRDB.