UN Habitat Award For Low Cost Housing Project

Online, April 28, 2011 (Newswire.com) - Tanaji Malusare City (TMC) has bagged the prestigious UN Habitat Business Award for its low cost housing project near Mumbai. TMC is a conglomerate of about 24,000 houses in a 100 acre township near Karjat railway junction, about 200 km from Mumbai. With a capacity to house about 60,000 people, TMC is India's largest master-planned social housing project. Located within MMRDA's urbanisable development zone, it is connected by road and rail to major employment regions in and around Mumbai.

The tree-lined township is self-contained with roads, playgrounds, shopping centres and schools. The houses boast urban amenities such as regular electricity and water supply. A new technology in use has virtually eliminated the use of bricks. The new technology is being hailed as an example of sustainable urbanisation and reduces carbon emissions by about 2 tonnes per unit. Its low cost makes it attractive to the masses; the model is replicable and skills can be transferred easily to the local people. These attributes put TMC at the epicentre of the low cost housing movement.

The UN Habitat programme supports socially and environmentally sustainable towns and cities with the mission of providing shelter for all. The UN Habitat Business Award has been instituted in recognition of the role that private businesses can play in combining new technologies with business models that can offer shelter and basic infrastructure to low-income urban populations, while at the same time generating profit for themselves.

When asked about the award, Mr Amod Kumar Singh, Vice President, Strategic Finance, TMC said, "we believed that our project should go beyond the mere delivery of physical housing units. Our vision is to build green-field cities for the poor. We are happy that our efforts have been recognised." The TMC project is master-planned by SKM Consulting, Australia.