Bhubaneswar, Jul 5 (IANS): Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Monday requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi to open the window of Aawaas+ mobile app for one month to migrate the data of PMAY-Gramin.

In a letter to the Prime Minister, Patnaik said he, in December last year, had requested to include about 6 lakh identified eligible households of the districts not affected by cyclone FANI, under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY -G).

However, the Ministry of Rural Development had opened Aawaas+ window only for the 14 cyclone FANI affected districts for a period of one month, he said.

"The process of identification could not be taken up in the remaining 16 districts not affected by cyclone FANI. These are predominantly tribal dominated districts and cover all the KBK areas," Patnaik said in his letter.

He said the State has identified the left-out eligible households in these districts through a State-developed rural housing portal observing a procedure similar to Aawaas+.

In this backdrop, the chief minister requested the PM to instruct the Ministry of Rural Development to open the window of Aawaas+ mobile app for the entire State for a period of one month to migrate the data of identified eligible households to Aawaas+. This will be a pragmatic step towards achieving the objective of 'Safe housing for all', he added.

Patnaik thanked the Prime Minister for allotting 8.17 lakh target for Odisha under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana. This will provide shelter security to the cyclone FANI affected families, he said.

Extremely severe cyclone FANI had hit Odisha at a wind speed of about 200 kmph on May 3, 2019 and devastated over 20,000 villages in 14 coastal districts of Odisha.