New Delhi: The Centre has challenged the West Bengal Government in the Supreme Court over the latter's Housing Industry Regulation Act (HIRA), 2017.
Talking to ETV Bharat, Union Secretary for Housing and Urban Affairs, Durga Shankar Mishra said that his ministry had filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court (SC) challenging the Housing Industry Regulation Act, 2017 of the West Bengal Government.
"When you have a central law, how can you implement a state law and that too without the Centre's consent," said Mishra.
"Earlier there were no regulations to maintain transparency in the housing sector. We had initiated RERA to keep real estate owners and builders under control," said Mishra.
The Centre has brought the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 aiming to protect home buyers as well as help boost investments in the real estate industry. The West Bengal Government, on the contrary, brought out a different law in the real estate sector called HIRA, 2017.
"A group of home buyers and associations in West Bengal have already filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the validity of HIRA. And we have also filed an affidavit challenging HIRA," said Mishra.
He said, "When there are two different laws over the same issue, people will get confused."
The Union Secretary has said that almost 31 states had initiated RERA law and 28 states had already got the authority. "With RERA in force, we have tried to keep the builders and real estate owners under control," said Mishra.
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