the goan I network
PANAJI
The Urban Development Ministry and its bureaucracy are dragging their feet over putting in place a water tight regime to regulate Goa’s real estate industry mandated by the Centre’s big ticket reform -- The Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016.
More than a year after it notified the rules, the Goa government’s Urban Development Ministry has only granted extensions of the deadline for builders and real estate companies to register their ongoing projects under RERA.
In the latest such order issued on June 27 by R Menaka, IAS, the director of Urban Development, the deadline has been extended by three months, from July 2 to October 1. Menaka also stipulates in the same order that project registration will now entail a penalty of Rs 3-lakhs. The penalty was Rs 2-lakhs when the deadline was previously extended by two months in April last.
However, there is little visible progress by the government in setting up the Apeallete Authority which will adjudicate complaints from home buyers and other real estate clients against builders and developers and vice-versa. Apparently a section of Goa’s powerful builders and real estate firms have failed to get their act together and have managed to get the government to keep pushing the deadline.
Noted consumer activist Roland Martins blamed poor awareness among Goa’s home buyers of their rights under RERA which he says allows the State government to dither amid lack of sufficient public pressure.
“I will take up the issue in the next meeting of the Consumer Protection Council,” Martins told The Goan. He also hoped that it will come into focus in the deliberations of the upcoming session of the Goa Legislative Assembly.
Housing and real estate professionals meanwhile are upbeat over the impact of RERA. Manguesh Prabhugaonker, the chairman of the Goa Chapter of the Indian Institute of Architects says it is a big game changer and will revolutionise the relationship between project promoters and buyers.
RERA is a regulatory authority with sweeping quasi-judicial powers for the real estate sector, almost on the lines of what SEBI is for the capital markets.
It has provisions to protect home buyers on issues of timely completion of projects and delivery, land title status, quality of construction. In the Goan context, it could end the rampant problem of irregular titles owing to the failure to register housing society’s and the reluctance of builders/promoters to convey the land titles to such societies.
RERA mandates formations of these societies or Resident Welfare Associations within 3 months of majority of the units in a project being sold. It also provides for a penalty of up to 10 per-cent of total project cost and even imprisonment for violations.
According to Manguesh, less than half of the sector in Goa has understood the new reforms which is why RERA is yet to make the impact it is billed to.
“Many stakeholders are still in the process of streamlining their disorganised methodologies. It is taking time given the complexities of the modalities and paperwork,” Manguesh told The Goan.
The scales in the housing and real estate sector have for long tilted heavily in favour of the builder and RERA, it is widely believed, has the potential to level things. However, how much and how soon it will succeed hinges on the very lobby whose influence it’s aiming to eliminate -- the powerful builders and their famed imprint on governance in Goa.
