Credai to MPs: Realty reforms must in consumer interest

Real estate body makes a strong case for administrative, land, fiscal, tax and banking reforms to boost GDP growth and ensure transparency in clearances of housing projects

• Hails FDI in retail as a right, bold step
• Hopes buyer-seller interests will be taken care of
• Writes open letter to law makers
• Land Acquisition and Realty Regulator Bills expected in Parliament soon

Close on the heels of passage of the FDI retail proposal in Parliament, the Confederation of Real Estate Developers' Association (Credai) appealed to MPs from all parties to consider real estate reforms to protect the interests of consumers. Credai has made a strong case for reforms specially administrative, land, fiscal, tax and banking, to  boost GDP growth and ensure transparency in clearances of housing projects, thus providing homes to all. Further, it wants a single-window system of clearances to eliminate human interface that breeds corruption and make funds available to both developers and buyers at affordable and reasonable rates of interest.

Credai national president, Lalit Kumar Jain, said that Punjab had already moved ahead with the single-window system and Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh were moving in that direction. The comprehensive reforms and the regulator must also include provisions to punish officials who are either corrupt or just sit on files to draw a vicarious pleasure by inordinately delaying proposals from developers. For instance, the environment departments cause green terror by not approving proposals for months and years, Jain said.

Referring to the Land Acquisition and Real Estate Regulatory Bills which are likely to be moved in the ongoing Parliament’s winter session, Jain said the regulatory bill appears to be incomplete and even one-sided as it seeks to punish errant developers while ignoring the defaulting buyers and corrupt and procrastinating officials. The Land Acquisition bill may make housing costlier.
 
“Though the government is moving in the right direction with bold reforms agenda,  much more can be achieved without any controversy and incurring additional cost just by focusing on the housing sector. Now is the time for speedily taking up the issues concerning real estate sector with the target of ensuring homes for all,” Credai national president Lalit Kumar Jain said in his communication to Members of Parliament.
 
“Everyone talks about mass and affordable housing and in fact the government has coined a slogan called Housing for All. All of us know that shelter is the most common necessity of a human being after food and water. But sadly, the powers that be have failed to address the issue apart from doing mere lip-service,” he argued.

But the realty bill, in its current form and shape, stifles the honest developer and scares away new entrepreneurs from entering the sector, Jain said and asked: “How can you expect the industry to grow if you discourage it at all stage of business?”