The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has circulated a draft Cabinet note on relaxing foreign direct investment (FDI) norms for the housing sector,which proposed easing the three-year lock-in period among other things. The draft note has proposed easing the three-year lock-in period for FDI in housing and townships,besides it has sought reduction in the minimum capitalisation to $5 million from the present $10 million for wholly-owned subsidiaries,a senior official in the ministry said. The proposal to ease the FDI guidelines for the sector was mooted by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation. The note has also suggested a cut in the minimum built-up area of 50,000 sq mts in case of construction development projects to 20,000 sq mts of carpet area for FDI. The official said there is also a need to define the word ‘completion’ in the current policy on the matter of reducing three year lock-in period.

Raheja gets best developer award for third time

Raheja Developers,have been awarded “the best developer of India 2013” award by Euromoney real estate polls in the UK for the third consecutive year. Euromoney is a leading financial markets magazine. The survey took opinions of real estate developers,advisers,financial institutions,investors and end-users worldwide who were asked to name the firms they thought were best at providing products and services in their market in the last one year. Raheja Developers chairman Navin Raheja,who is president of the National Real Estate Development Council,a regulatory body under the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation,said,“Winning such international accolades do boast one’s morale and it encourages me to serve my countrymen with world class abode.”

RLDA targets over Rs1,000 crore from commercialisation

Stepping up efforts for generating Rs 1,000 crore revenue from railway land,the Rail Land Development Authority (RLDA) has concretised an action plan to develop 75 multi-functional complex (MFC) sites in the current fiscal. RLDA,a statutory authority established by the Railways Ministry for generating non-tariff revenue from railway land,has initiated the bidding process for the construction of MFC near stations across the country for commercial utilisation. Prominent stations,where MFC are coming up,include Dehradun,Ujjain,Vasai Road,Lokmanya Tilak Terminus,Gulbarga,Vijayawada,Amritsar,Amethi and Chandigarh.