Respond to Centre’s queries on RERA rules before May 15, SC tells States

On Feb. 14, the court asked Centre to study whether rules framed by States are in conformity with interests of home buyers

A view of Supreme Court of India in New Delhi. File | Photo Credit: S. Subramanium

The Supreme Court on Monday asked chief secretaries of States to respond to queries raised by the Centre on implementation of rules framed under the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) (RERA) Act, 2016 in their respective jurisdictions.

A Bench of Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and Surya Kant said that in March 2022 the Centre had written to States and union territories for information about the agreement of sales rules notified under the RERA Act. However, only five States had responded so far.

“In order to facilitate the exercise carried out by the Union of India, we direct all the chief secretaries to respond to the queries raised with RERA rules on or before May 15”, the Bench said.

It asked Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati and amicus curiae Devashish Bharuka to also file a status report after receiving the relevant information from the States.

The court posted the matter for third week of July.

On February 14, the top court had directed the Centre to examine whether the rules framed by various States under the RERA Act were in conformity with the interests of home buyers.

It had given three months to the Centre to examine if there were deviations in the rules framed by the States to the rules framed by the Union government in 2016 and to place the report by the first week of May 2022.

Model agreement

On January 17, the top court had emphasised the need for a model builder-buyer agreement to safeguard the interests of middle-class home buyers and asked the Centre to consider framing uniform rules under the provisions of the RERA.

On October 4 last year, the top court had said it was important for the country to have a model builder-buyer agreement in the real estate sector for consumer protection because developers try to put numerous clauses in it, which common people might not be aware of.

The hearing was based on a petition filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay seeking a direction to the Centre to frame a uniform model builder-buyer agreement to ensure transparency in the real estate sector.