Prime Minister Imran Khan this week launched the Naya Pakistan Housing Programme. The goal is to construct five million low-cost homes over the next five years. It is, in his words, an ambitious project. All the more so given that is running out almost before it has begun. The scheme envisages applicants paying off mortgages over a period of 10-20 years. A national financial regulatory body will be set up in the next two months to facilitate funds. Registration is open from today. And pilot schemes have been earmarked for seven cities: including the federal capital, Gilgit and Muzaffarabad. Though not much, if anything, has been mentioned in terms of timeframes or financing schedules. At a time when the country is looking to sign a $12 billion IMF bailout package the need for transparent feasibility reports is more urgent than ever. In terms of logistics, the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) is taking the lead in identifying those in need. And while, NADRA claimed back in 2012 that 96 percent (or 89.5 million) of adult Pakistanis hold national identity cards this does not overlook the fact that procedures for registration and even renewal of CNICs are not as efficient as they could be. And then there is the price factor; with subsidies being withdrawn in the run-up to the summer’s general election. Meaning that the most vulnerable may once more be left floundering below the safety net. Such as those living in katchi abadis. The latter have long been on the receiving end of state brutality in terms of the violent demolition of these informal settlements; as was seen back in 2015 in Islamabad. This prompted the Awami Workers Party (AWP) to file a petition before the Supreme Court (SC) demanding compensation and resettlement for the affected. The AWP, along with the Law and Justice Commission of Pakistan, went on to prepare a draft law on slum dwellings. This Chief Justice this week heard a case on the bill. And in a welcome move, Justice Saqib Nisar directed Prime Minister Imran Khan to accompany him to view some of these areas; to see for himself the dire conditions there. All the while underscoring how the Naya Pakistan Housing Scheme is not a panacea for the country’s most socio-economically marginalised. Where the PM’s initiative has succeeded is, to a certain extent, in putting the question of low-cost housing centre-stage at the federal level. For far too long have enterprises aimed at securing the rights of the poor, such as those pertaining to warm shelter or getting child beggars off the streets and into schools, been outsourced by the state to the non-governmental sector. Or else to so-called Leftist fringe parties. The AWP has worked hard to debunk this stereotype. By going to the top court in the land it has successfully framed as a national concern the penalising of the working poor for being homeless. What is now needed is for all stakeholders to work together for a common good that sees no child, family or (wo)man left out in the cold. Quite literally. * Published in Daily Times, October 12th 2018.