ICCPL-R&M Webseries-9 RERA a boon for industry Rajive Kumar announcement on loan recast makes big news

The ninth edition of Realty Webseries, hosted by realty magazine Realty & More and PR firm ICCPL on July 4, made national headlines as UP RERA Chairman Rajive Kumar announced there that the regulatory bodies would be writing within a week to the RBI seeking one-time debt restructuring for the real estate industry.

“The issue of loan restructuring has been around for a long time and a letter to the RBI for loan restructuring would be going this week”, Kumar announced spreading cheer among the participants and the real estate industry at large.

Speaking on the theme ‘Three Years of RERA’, the UP RERA chief informed at the webinar that out of almost 26,000 complaints, more than 19,000 have been dispose of by the Authority. And there are lot of builders who have also tried their best to see that those orders get complied with. “So, this is one area where we need to be working together”, he said.

Speaking about the biggest takeaway of RERA, Supertech Chairman RK Arora said after its advent, people’s trust in the sector has been restored. Of course, he said, it will take time as the rot in the industry had run too deep because of funds diversion and non-completion of projects by many a developer. Therefore, he said, having a regulator for the industry was absolutely essential.

Hailing RERA as a boon for the industry, Deepak Kapoor, Director of Gulshan Homz, said the Act has bridged the trust between the homebuyers and the developers. Earlier, he said, millions of buyers didn’t know how and where to get their grievances addressed. They used to go from one forum to another and even then they were not able to get timely solution to their problem. Now RERA provides them time-bound solution, he said.

Manoj Gaur, MD, Gaurs Group, said the reconciliation forum created by UP RERA has been of great success. Credai members, he said, participated in it and RERA officials also provided help resulting in many a case getting solved without a formal RERA order.  

Ashish Bhutani, CEO of Bhutani Group, said RERA has been getting global acclaim. “Every buyer and investor now knows that now no developer will be able to do any wrongdoing as a robust regulator is there”, he said. RERA has been one of the best things that has happened in the industry in the past few years, he stressed.

According to Dhruv Agarwala, Group CEO, PropTiger.com, Housing.com, Makaan.com, said, “We all have to be mindful of one thing that buying a house is the most expensive purchase decision of any family. It is very crucial that they feel comfortable that if something goes wrong, they have a place where they can be heard. RERA has played that role.” 

R&M Editor Palash Roy interjected to ask if there are any challenges or if there is any fine-tuning or any amendments which are required at this point of time.

RERA expert and UP RERA Advisor Venket Rao replied to this by saying, “The restrictive way of drafting the orders that could only be issued to the promoters or the allottees or to the agents, the restrictive reading of it at times creates a lot of hassles.” That’s where, he said, at times there is a level of ambiguity. “We need to, probably somewhere down the line, pay attention to that”, he said.