RERA: Centre to hold workshop with home-buyers, builders, banks on November 15

For effective implementation of the Real Estate Act, the Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry will hold a day-long workshop for home-buyers, bank representatives, builders and other stakeholders from northern states on November 15, an official said.

According to the official, the participants from the northern states, including Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Punjab, will discuss issues pertaining to the legislation of 2016, which provides proper protection to home-buyers.

The Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act was enacted by Parliament and states were given powers to notify their respective rules and appoint regulatory authorities.

The official said home-buyers can raise issues pertaining to delay in delivery of flats in the workshop. The legislation provides for timely delivery of housing units by builders whose projects are registered under it.

"It has been two years since the legislation was enacted by Parliament. We want all stakeholders -- banks, regulatory authorities, home-buyers and builders -- to discuss issues pertaining to its implementation," the official said.

Similar workshops had been organised in Pune and Chennai earlier.

Till last month, 13 states and union territories have appointed a permanent regulator, while 14 have interim regulators. Kerala is in the process of setting up a regulator.

As many as 22 states and union territories have functional web portals under the law.

As many as 32,923 real estate projects have been registered under the legislation across the country. Also, 25,247 real estate agents have been registered under it.

The official said that barring West Bengal, six northeastern states and Jammu and Kashmir, all states and union territories have been implementing its provisions.

In the Northeast, Arunchal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and Sikkim have not notified the legislation and its rules so far due to land-related and other issues.

West Bengal has notified its own real estate act -- the Housing and Industrial Regulation Act, 2017 (HIRA) -- instead of implementing the central law. Housing and Urban Affairs secretary Durga Shanker Mishra has earlier written to the state government asking it to repeal its own act as there is a central law on the same subject.