Policy booklets held up at the launch of the Shramik Nivas policy. Photo: Minister M.B. Patil’s media team
Bengaluru: The Karnataka government has brought in the ‘Shramik Nivas’ policy to provide quality housing for manufacturing workers close to the industries where they work, Large and Medium Industries Minister M.B. Patil said in a statement released on Saturday.
Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar unveiled the policy on Thursday, November 12. Patil said the government’s aim is to provide secure housing for hard-working employees, which would spare them the daily commute from other towns and raise productivity. Dormitories, one-room houses and two-room houses will be built near industries that employ large numbers of workers, and they will be given on affordable rent or free of charge, he said.
Water and electricity will be supplied to the housing at industrial rates, Patil said. The subsidy will be paid in three equal instalments over three years from the day workers start living in the houses, he said.
“We want the state’s industrial areas to have attractive facilities that suit large investment,” Patil said. In the first phase, 30,000 houses will be built under Shramik Nivas, he said. A company housing 100 employees will get a subsidy of ₹1 crore, one housing 1,000 employees ₹10 crore, and one housing 2,500 workers a maximum of ₹25 crore, he said. He urged large industries to make use of the scheme.
Under the scheme, dormitories of up to 10 sq m, single-bedroom houses of up to 30 sq m and double-bedroom houses of up to 60 sq m can be built, Patil said. Industrialists must build them within the plots allotted to them through the KIADB, he said.
The target is to house a maximum of 10,000 workers a year, and requests for more workers will be considered in the following year, Patil said. Only permanent employees of companies are eligible, and workers’ dependants are not covered, he said. A company can get a subsidy of up to ₹25 crore, he added.
“Workers are an integral part of industries. Our wish is that people who do hard work should live in peace. Housing will end their unnecessary travel and also raise industrial productivity, which will benefit the state’s economy. That is why we have brought in the Shramik Nivas scheme,” Patil said.
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