Recently, as India swelled with pride to see the first woman belonging to the Scheduled Tribe community become president, it also witnessed unexpected chaos stemming from the use of gendered language. In Hindi, the word for president is the masculine word Rashtrapati (head of the nation). The suffix pati is commonly used to mean “husband” and can also denote that one is the owner of something. In a bid to use a feminine equivalent, a member of Parliament unwittingly referred to her as Rashtrapatni (wife of the nation). The linguistic flub resulted in huge protests and adjournment of Parliament followed by a letter of apology.

At a recent event, Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave away keys to seventy five thousand beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana — Urban (PMAY-U) in Uttar Pradesh. Though it is a welcome and much needed move, the overall pace of delivery under PMAY-U has been rather slow. As of October 11, 2021, just around 50% of the 114 lakh sanctioned houses have been completed. In the process, ₹97,000 crore has already been incurred. 

On May 30, 2021, as India reeled under the second wave of the pandemic, a team of surveyors from Bihar’s revenue department landed up in the western town of Chhapra. At a street near the city municipality building, where the state government has proposed a new flyover, the officials measured the land where shops and homes would be demolished to make way for the construction.

As the Model Act has been circulated by the central government amongst the states, it is yet to be seen what changes are incorporated by the latter to suit the local context. While the Act is a much-needed reform for India’s housing sector, one hopes that states use this opportunity to unlock the economic value of vacant housing and increase access to good quality housing, for all demographics.

By providing a Record of Rights (RoRs) to village household owners in inhabited rural areas, it attempts to create accurate land and property records, which can be pivotal in reducing property-related disputes and facilitating monetisation of rural residential assets for credit and other financial services.

The traditionally inhabited portions of rural India have largely remained unsurveyed—except for Odisha and Karnataka, to a certain degree—since colonial times.