A mentally-challenged woman in Fulbari Upazila of Dinajpur district is going to have a new home from the government in line with its pledge to provide all the homeless people with homes.

The woman, Rubina Begum, 36, daughter of late Abdul Wahid of Madhyampara village of the upazila. is going to have a semi-pucca house from Ashrayan Project-2 under the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

The money has recently been allocated to construct the house, said sources at the PMO.

Rubina was married off 15 years ago, but her husband went abroad abandoning her. The poor woman then took shelter in her paternal house.

A few months later, she lost her father while her mother died a long ago.  Her younger brother, Ashraful Alam, is also a physically-challenged man.

Rubina, better known as Ruby, now lives in a shabby mud-house along with her brother Ashraful Alam. Their sufferings go beyond limits during monsoon as raindrops fall into their worn-out house through its broken roof.

Their plight came in the limelight following media reports recently.

Director of Ashrayan Project-2 Md Mahbub Hossain said efforts are on to build houses for all the homeless people within the Mujib Year as per the directive of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

He said Rubina will also get a semi-pucca house soon under the Ashrayan Project as the fund has already been allocated to construct the house.

The Ashrayan Project-2 has been taken to rehabilitate some 2.50 lakh landless-homeless families. Some two lakh poor families have been settled under the project, according to the project website.

In 1997, the Ashrayan Project was undertaken following the directive of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina as a devastating cyclone hit the coastlines, leaving many people homeless.  

Sheikh Hasina visited the scenes and instructed to launch the Ashrayan Project seeing the miseries and sufferings of people there.  Since then, some three lakh families have been rehabilitated under the Ashrayan Project.