NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday slammed the state governments for their apathy and insensitivity towards the plight of homeless people in the country and appealed to them to show "sympathy and compassion" by constructing shelter homes for them for which more than Rs 2000 crore have been granted by Centre since 2013. 

A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta pointed out the utter insensitivity of state governments for neglecting the plight of urban homeless people. It said that benefits under Centre's ambitious project National Urban Livelihoods Mission(NULM) were not reaching to the homeless and even suggested the Centre to scrap the scheme as the welfare funds were being siphoned off by state governments.

National Urban Livelihoods Mission was launched in 2013 with a laudable objective to provide shelter to homeless people in urban areas and over the years, more than Rs 2,000 crore were allocated but the homeless continue to languish on streets with no roof over their head. 

Holding that NULM mission to provide shelter remains a dream, the bench even suggested the Centre to scrap the scheme as the welfare funds were being siphoned off by state governments. 

A supreme Court appointed panel headed by a former Delhi High Judge has also projected a very grim picture for urban homeless people saying that more than 90 percent of them have no roof over their heads as "state governments have pathetically failed in setting up shelter homes." 

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