Odisha has proposed adding 28 more urban local bodies (ULBs) to the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana-Urban (PMAY-U) 2.0, a move that could extend the central housing scheme’s coverage to all 100 ULBs in the state. The housing and urban development department has directed executive officers in the newly proposed ULBs to begin identifying eligible beneficiaries and start preparatory work for implementation.
The proposal will allow more eligible urban households to seek assistance for constructing or purchasing houses under PMAY-U 2.0. According to the department’s official order, local authorities have been instructed to identify beneficiaries and facilitate enrolment in accordance with the scheme guidelines.
The newly proposed ULBs include Badamba, Narasinghpur and Salipur in Cuttack district, and Pallahara in Angul district, among others. The department’s instructions cover 28 additional ULBs and are intended to widen the scheme’s reach in smaller towns, where officials said demand for affordable housing has been growing.
A senior official said the beneficiary identification process would include verification of applicants’ housing and income status. The stated objective is to ensure that eligible urban poor and middle-income families without a pucca house can access benefits under the scheme. The official’s comments were reported by the Times of India.
The immediate administrative task for the newly proposed ULBs will be to identify potential beneficiaries and facilitate their enrolment. Sources cited in the report said the identification drive was likely to begin after local-level instructions were issued by the respective ULBs. The process will determine which applicants meet the scheme’s eligibility requirements before benefits are extended.
Odisha has already sanctioned 24,625 houses under PMAY 2.0, according to figures reported by the housing and urban development department. Of these, ULBs have geo-tagged 23,464 sites, while foundation work has begun for 3,134 houses. A total of 2,008 houses have reached the completion stage.
The figures show that the scheme has moved beyond sanctioning in a substantial number of cases, but they also indicate different stages of progress between approval, site verification, construction and completion. The proposed inclusion of 28 more ULBs will therefore add a new beneficiary-identification and enrolment phase to the implementation process.
The proposal is expected to support wider housing coverage across urban Odisha, particularly by bringing smaller urban settlements into the scheme’s administrative framework. The next steps are the identification and verification of eligible households by the executive officers of the newly proposed ULBs, followed by enrolment under the scheme guidelines.