Letters to the editor dated October 06, 2021

Apropos the editorial ‘Building blocks’ (October 6), even though the rising demand for residential buildings is an impetus to create a multiplier effect, the over-indebted realty sector continues to be risky for funding.

An upswing in the earnings of consumers doesn’t seem likely in the immediate future. The creation of jobs in other segments of the economy is time-consuming due to the persisting negative effects of the pandemic.

Furthermore, because of the lack of transparency in dealings, there’s a lack of confidence amongst realty sector consumers. The developmental financial institutions need to finance the builders and developers with easy payback periods to enable the borrowers service the debt in a timely manner and curtail the chance of default.

As the growth of the sector is key to reviving an economy hit by the fallouts of Covid, the government must look to provide more incentives like cut in interest rates and reduction in the costs for registration of property, and the realty regulator must enforce robust surveillance standards to ensure high transparency in the dealings of builders and developers.

It is imperative to ensure that the buyers of residential units will not face any problems in the event of non-compliance of contracts entered into by the realtors either with the lenders or with government agencies.

Changanacherry, Kerala

The real estate sector may be a big employment generator and a significant contributor to GDP but the flip-side cannot be ignored. Even the most reputed builders have often duped the home buyers as the many cases in the courts show. Real estate has been a huge generator of black money and provided scope for the underworld to flourish.

Urban Housing is regarded as a plum Cabinet post as it provides many opportunities to indulge in corruption. An inordinately large percentage of politicians are builders, which tells its own story. The reason for the surge in sale of residential flats is due to the pent-up demand.

Mumbai

The ‘Pandora Papers’ has once again affirmed how global elites have continued to exploit the loopholes in the existing tax laws and lax jurisdiction in tax havens to ring-fence their complex offshore structures from scrutiny by tax authorities. It’s a shocking revelation that over 300 Indians have set up offshore structures and several of them have declared themselves bankrupt before tribunals but hold billions through such offshore entities.

This has rightly prompted the CBDT to announce a multi-agency probe to investigate these cases. While this is a step in the right direction, much needs to be done. Concerted measures to address the gaps in the tax system while expanding the kind of disclosures required to monitor such transactions and enforcing them strictly are the need of the hour.

Sholavandan, TN

The Lakhimpur Kheri incident is reprehensible. Undoubtedly opposition parties are fishing in troubled waters and striving to draw maximum political mileage. This issue, like many others, shall also blow over with time.

The Yogi government has mishandled the pandemic, enacted regressive laws to create communal disharmony and there has been no perceptible development in the State. And yet, the opposition so far has been a mute spectator.

Noida

The second wave of coronavirus wreaked havoc across the country, but still there are many people who neither wear masks nor follow SOPs. Those found without face-masks must be fined heavily — even if they be VIPs. To tackle the Covid situation, there is a need for many more vaccination centres and the vaccination capacity must also be enhanced. The facilities at government hospitals to treat Covid patients also need to be scaled up.

Mumbai