Sri Lanka to go ahead with housing project

The Sri Lanka government has decided to go ahead with the plan to build 65,000 houses in the civil war-hit Northern and Eastern Provinces. In an interview with The Hindu , Minister in charge of Rehabilitation, Resettlement and Prison Reforms D.M. Swaminathan said the project would take off “in a couple of months”. At present, the process of receiving feedback on the project was under way. Two model houses had been set up in Jaffna.

This year, 11,000 houses had been planned with 18,000 houses annually for the next three years. “We are consulting with people. So far, we have received 14,000 applications,” he said.

On issues such as durability and servicing of houses, the Minister said the executing agency of the project, ArcelorMittal Construction, France, would open an office in Jaffna to address the issues. The guarantee period of the houses would be 30 years and each house would have lifetime of 60 years to 70 years.