Ashwini Priolker CNBC-TV18
The Maharashtra government has ambitious plans to build 19.4 lakh affordable homes by 2022. The government has aligned its Housing for All goal with the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna. But surprisingly, till now not a single affordable home project has been sanctioned under affordable housing in partnership with private developers. The policy was rolled out in 2015.
PMAY has provided every state with four verticals through which it can implement the scheme. These four verticals are as follows:
1) In Situ Slum redevelopment
2) Affordable housing through credit linked subsidy
3) Affordable housing in partnership with private sector or public sector
4) Subsidy for beneficiary-led individual house construction for enhancement
While there are 60,000 projects ongoing in the state through 3 other verticals, the government has so far failed in attracting the interest of private developers. In order to participate in this initiative, a developer should have a project of at least 250 units out of which 35 percent should be reserved for PMAY.
“The main problem is the availability of the land in the state. Acquiring land has been very difficult for both private as well as public agencies,” says Ashutosh Limaye, National Director-Research, JLL India.
However, things might change after the government recently brought out the Public Private Partnership Models for Affordable Housing in India in order to attract private sector’s partnership into PMAY.
The new PPP policy addresses the concerns of private developers and provides for six models for affordable housing to be built on government land. Two models have been provided for affordable housing to be built on private land as well. For the very first time, affordable units built on private land are brought into the ambit of PMAY.
The notification for the policy is yet to come. “We have some concerns with regards to this policy. The Central government had asked the state government to send their suggestions and objections. We have already sent our suggestions. We are now waiting to see how the final notification looks and whether our concerns have been addressed,” said a senior official from the housing ministry.
Given the current market condition, it will be interesting to see whether the new policy actually manages to attract private developers to PMAY.
“Earlier, the guidelines in PMAY were quite ambiguous. In the current market conditions, the developers are in a completion mode rather than expansion. The developers should be involved more actively while forming such policies,” says Rajesh Prjapati, MD Prajapati Group and Managing Committee Member- MCHI-CREDAI.re
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