Pune
The Union minister of housing and urban affairs on Sunday said he would tell the state government’s housing department to look into bringing the unregistered projects under the Maharashtra Real Estate Regulatory Authority’s ambit.
Hardeep Singh Puri, the Union minister of housing and urban affairs, said he would be writing to Maharashtra chief minister and the Maharashtra Real Estate Regulatory Authority (MahaRERA) within the next fortnight to do the needful.
He made the commitment after hearing Shirish Deshpande, the chairman of Mumbai Grahak Panchayat — the Maharashtra consumers’ forum — in a meeting of the ministry of housing and urban affairs in Delhi.
The meeting was held under the chairmanship of Union finance minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, to discuss various issues concerning the real estate sector and the steps to be taken to strengthen it.
Deshpande told TOI that Section 4 (2)[c] of Real Estate Regulatory Authority Act requiring builders to produce sanctioned building plan and commencement certificate for registration was not mandatory in nature. This was also put forth by Madhya Pradesh RERA chief and RERA chiefs of other states too echoed it, he said.
Against this backdrop, Deshpande expressed hope that there was no need to amend Section 4 (2) [c] and projects could be registered with RERA without those certificates. “This will bring a huge number of unregistered projects under the ambit of MahaRERA,” he said.
Another participating member said the act clearly stated that if any project had not received completion certificate in 2017, when the act came into force, it would come under RERA irrespective of registration. “If any such projects are not registered, they would have to be registered and if it is not it is the duty of the authority to ensure registration,” said an activist.
Consumers have been approaching MahaRERA for registered projects so far.
The state consumers’ forum also put forth the delay in bringing redevelopment projects under MahaRERA. The state real estate regulatory authority has proposed an amendment to the existing rules to bring the rehabilitation and sale components of redevelopment projects under the ambit of the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act. MahaRERA has sent a letter to chief minister Devendra Fadnavis for his approval to the amendment proposal.
Shirish Deshpande, the chairman of Mumbai Grahak Panchayat, said rules would have to be amended to consider any redevelopment project as “a whole project.”
The components related to the rehabilitation for the owners and sale are now accounted separately.
The developers now register only the sale component.
It will bring all redevelopment projects, with the rehabilitation components, under RERA.