Life Towers' to rehab homeless, landless

Thiruvananthapuram: As part of the Life Mission initiative, the state government has decided to set up Life Towers at 56 spots in the state for rehabilitating the landless and homeless. The government has identified 3.3 lakh beneficiaries who have no land and home in the state for the project. As many as 56 plots owned by the government and public-sector undertakings have been identified for the project.

The bid has been invited to appoint project management consultants for preparing the Detailed Project Report for the projects. The technical and financial bid for appointing the consultants will be opened next month.  "We have invited three separate bids from well-experienced consultants for preparing the DPR for the project which will be coming up in three regions of the state. We were able to find out around 56 spots, most of them belonging to the government. The construction alone is estimated to cost around Rs 500 crores. The government has earmarked funds in the recent budget and excess fund would be raised through sponsorships. MP and MLA funds also could be used for the purpose," the official.

As per the preliminary survey carried out by the authorities, there are around 3.3 lakh beneficiaries, however, the authorities are planning to conduct more screening to ensure that only real beneficiaries are on the final list. The plan is to implement the project under EPC (Engineering, Procurement, and Construction) mode.

"Once the DPRs get the administrative sanction suitable agencies will be roped in to execute the project under EPC mode. The agency will be responsible for all the activities including the design, procurement," said the official.  The official said that cost-effective and globally accepted modern technologies would be explored for the project. "The conventional method is expensive and there are other successful available methods like prefabricated structures," the official added.