Govt moves to fix real estate mess

Aims to revive stalled projects, insolvent developers and speed up debt recovery

- Gireesh Chandra Prasad & Rituraj Baruah

The ministry is in the process of setting up a committee with members from different ministries and regulatory agencies.

(MINT)

India is gearing up for a significant overhaul of its real estate insolvency framework, with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) initiating high-level discussions across government ministries and regulatory agencies aimed at swiftly completing thousands of stalled housing projects.

The ministry is in the process of establishing an inter-ministerial committee charged with designing a blueprint of “commercially viable systemic reforms” to address the deep-seated distress in the property sector, two people aware of the development said. The central goal is to restore public confidence and accelerate debt resolution for insolvent developers.

The urgency stems from a crisis where vast sums of investor capital are trapped in delayed projects. An expert committee led by former G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant noted in July 2023 that investments exceeding ₹4 lakh crore were stuck in over 412,000 stressed dwelling units across the country. That figure, based on data from the Indian Banks Association, is widely believed to have increased since then.