RAWALPINDI: Punjab has disbursed more than Rs284.4 billion in interest-free housing loans to over 217,000 families under its Apni Chhat Apna Ghar programme, Housing Minister Bilal Yasin said on Friday, as he also inspected a Rawalpindi water project whose completion date and reach appear to have shrunk.
The loans have funded 126,239 completed houses, with 57,910 more nearing completion, officials told a review meeting. Applications have passed 1.528 million, and Yasin said the target of reaching more than 300,000 families would be met by the end of the fiscal year in June.
Disbursements have risen by about Rs41 billion since the end of August, when the programme had paid out Rs243 billion. The scheme won a UN-Habitat Scroll of Honour last month. With roughly 1.5 million applicants and a 300,000 target, about one in five applicants can expect a loan.
In Rawalpindi, Yasin inspected houses under construction and the filtration plant of the Chahan Dam water supply project, which he said would be completed next year and serve more than 250,000 people.
When work started in late 2024, the scheme was described as a Rs28.6 billion system funded by the Asian Development Bank, meant to serve about one million people and due for completion in December 2027. Land acquisition was then incomplete. The minister did not explain the difference in figures, which may refer to a first phase.
Yasin called the project a gift from Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz Sharif to the people of Rawalpindi, where water shortages have long forced residents to rely on tankers and falling groundwater.
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