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The RBI has said that in addition to small-value loans, home loans of up to `50 lakh (for houses of value up to `65 lakh) in metros and loans up to `40 lakh (home value `50 lakh) in other centres will be considered affordable housing. Home loan seekers will soon find themselves being increasingly wooed by banks, and affordable housing projects could get cheaper with the Reserve Bank of India announcing a raft of measures that encourages bank lending to these segment.

The RBI has said that in addition to small value loans, home loans to individuals up to Rs 50 lakh (for houses of value up to Rs 65 lakh) in metros and loans up to Rs 40 lakh (home value Rs 50 lakh) in other centres will be considered as affordable housing. Extending these loans will entitle banks to float infrastructure bonds up to seven years. Money raised under these bonds will not be subject to reserve requirements such as cash reserve ratio (CRR) and statutory liquidity ratio (SLR).
Eligible bonds will also get exemption in calculating priority sector lending targets.

Bankers said that they were preparing for a pick-up in home loans in light of the increase in tax breaks from Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 2 lakh. “The infrastructure status to affordable housing projects would make it easier for developers to get finance. Banks in any case were going after home loans given the absence of pick-up in corporate credit,“ said KR Kamath, chairman, Punjab National Bank. He added that banks also prefer home loans because these are less riskier as the lending is diversified and also provides them an opportunity to crosssell other services to borrowers.

“The measures make home loans more attractive but I do not know to what extent it will impact rates as most banks are already extending home loans close to their Base Rate,“ said Kamath. Base Rate is the benchmark rate below which banks are not allowed to price their loans.

The finance minister in the Budget had said that banks would be allowed to float long-term bonds for lending to infrastructure. Explaining the rationale to extend this facility for housing, the RBI said “Apart from what is technically defined as infrastructure, affordable housing is another segment of the economy which both requires long-term funding and is of critical importance. Accordingly, the Reserve Bank intends to ease the way for banks to raise longterm resources to finance their longterm loans to infrastructure as well as affordable housing. This will help promote both growth and stability, as well as improve the supply side.“

The RBI said that granting the exemptions will mitigate the asset-liability management (ALM) problems faced by banks in extending project loans to infrastructure and core industries sectors. “A collateral benefit if bank bond issuances prove successful is the development of the domestic corporate bond market,“ the RBI said.

The project, which began in 2010, was estimated to cost `35 crore. “We have asked the government for a revised sanction so that we can go ahead with the new design,“ said an official in the state highways department's metro wing.

Work on the flyover, set to come up at the Mount Poonamallee Road-Arcot Salai junction, was held up as a 600mlong-pipe carrying drinking water could not be shifted.
“Even Metrowater couldn't find a contractor who could do the job. Besides, the pipe was 1.5m wide. Any disruption in water supply would have led to a law and order issue. What could have been completed for `6 crore is now costing us `20 crore to change the design,“ the official said. The foundation piers will now be on both sides of the pipeline instead of going straight. This will mean more concrete and in effect, higher costs.

Just 20% of the project has been completed. And the original contractor has quit citing escalating costs. “While we are waiting for the revised sanction, we have asked the tender committee if we can float new tenders. This is to speed up the process,“ said the official.

When the work starts, it will take at least a year to complete.
This is second time there has been a change in design. The first time was when the design envisaging double columns was changed to one incorporations single columns. This was done to avoid damage to other underground utilities.

AAcquiring 9,600 sq m of land from 126 people also took a long time.

In response to a question in Lok Sabha, finance minister Arun Jaitley said 6,823 ineligible beneficiaries were detected in the 2008-09 agriculture debt waiver scheme. He said action was initiated against 5,411 bank officials and 22 FIRs were registered. The minister informed the House that 80,299 cases were looked into and in about 6,823 cases, benefits of the scheme went to ineligible beneficiaries.

The farm debt waiver scheme was announced in the

Justice P Devadass, rejecting 27-year-old Suganya's plea against imminent arrest, said that so far eight people had been arrested in connection with the collapse. Pointing out that Suganya was an architect and an employee of Dhrishticone Architectural Communications Private Limited, the judge said she was engaged by the promoter's company, Prime Sristi Housing. “In this case, Suganya is alleged to have participated in the preparation of the planning. Investigation is going on,“ the judge said, adding that it was not a fit case for anticipatory bail, especially at this crucial stage.

Noting that her architectural plan had to be approved by CMDA officials, Justice Devadass said, “It is to be proved by the CMDA officials as to how far they contributed for the collapse of the building. It is for the prosecution to collect evidence.“

An advocate, R Krishnamurthy, had filed an intervenor petition opposing anticipatory bail relief to the woman architect saying it would set a bad precedent.

In her petition, Suganya had sought anticipatory bail saying she had only co-designed the building and that she had no role in the construction. She said her role as a registered architect was limited only to deciding the height and shape, height of rooms, size of windows and placement of rooms inside the flats.

Relaxing FDI Limit In Housing Sector A Major Fillip

Among the budget proposals is an allocation of Rs 4,000 crore to affordable housing through the National Housing Bank (NHB), a reduction in the size of projects eligible for FDI (foreign direct investment) from 50,000 square metres to 20,000 square metre and halving the minimum investment limit for FDI to $5 million.

This move to relax FDI limit is seen to help increase development of lowcost housing. Further, the finance minister has allocated Rs 7,060 crore for developing 100 smart cities, redeveloping satellite towns of major cities as well as smaller cities and necessary incentives for real estate investment trusts (REITS), which will have a pass-through for the purpose of taxation, in effect avoiding double taxation.

Shriram Housing Finance is looking to raise nearly Rs 500 crore this fiscal through a combination of debt and portfolio securitization.

“We are going through a rating process and will soon go for funding,” Sujan Sinha, its CEO said.The company’s loan book, which was Rs 200 crore last fiscal, will double this year.

Muthoot Housing Finance (part of Muthoot Fincorp) plans Rs 300 crore this year from banks and secured bonds for onward lending.

“We’ll look at an equity infusion next fiscal,” Maneesh Srivastava, its CEO said. The company’s loan book of Rs 295 crore last fiscal will reach

The marginal reduction in cost of funds for rural housing is attracting new players. Earlier, most companies operated on a 2% spread (the difference between the cost of borrowing and lending). This is now set to increase. “The interest rate on rural housing is currently 9.6% and with the budget provisions, we expect to get refinance from NHB (National Housing Bank) to the extent of 6.6%,” KR BijiMon, chief general manager, Muthoot Finance said.

The Muthoot Group (of Muthoot Finance) has entered this space through Muthoot Home Fin India.

The home finance venture’s first year loan disbursal target is Rs 200 crore with 40% of the loan book earmarked towards financing the needs of rural areas.

In the case of home loans to the low income group in urban areas, some NBFCs are operating on higher spreads ranging from 3% to 5%

But industry observers feel that costing continues to pose a challenge with respect to execution of affordable housing projects.

“While loans up to Rs 50 lakh will be categorised as priority sector loans and the benefit on exemption of the CRR (cash reserve ratio and SLR (statutory liquidity ratio) can be passed on to end customers, costs like cement and labour are on an upward trajectory. In such projects, cost control is a key issue and continued rise in price of raw materials can impact working capital of developers,” Prakash Challa, chairman of finance and taxation committee of CREDAI (Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Association of India) said.

The Survey on Indian Epigraphy (1996) says Tamil Nadu is the biggest source of inscriptions in India. Inscriptions written in Tamil occupy the first position in the volume, amounting nearly to 20,000, followed by those in Kannada (10,600), Sanskrit (7,500) and Telugu (4,500).
Inscriptions in Tamil language dating to the third century BCE have been published in the survey .

The state department of archaeology has a separate epigraphy wing that was started in 1966. The primary function of this wing is to copy inscriptions on boulders, stone pillars, stones, temple walls and on copper plates. The inscriptions are deciphered, edited and published.
So far, about 14,000 inscriptions have been copied and preserved in this wing. Some original copper plates and old palm leaf manuscripts are also under the custody of this department.

Yet, this is only a fraction of the inscriptions in the state that have been published. Despite several painstaking efforts in epigraphy , including by foreign scholars, the sad part is various universities and Tamil scholars show no interest in inscriptions.

Temple authorities forget these are treasure troves of history . They focus on deities neglecting temple history .

For instance, a team of epigraphists and photographers associated with the French government's Ecole Francaise de Extreme Orient visited the Mangaipagar temple in Piranmalai, Trichy district, several times between 2009 and 2014 to find new inscriptions and check on those published in the past. But the priest refused to let them enter despite the experts explaining that they wanted to read a Kulothunga Chozhan inscription of late 11th century . During the fourth visit, a new priest had taken over and he let the team in. The experts found that the inscriptions had been hidden under a coat of sandalwood paste ­ `Santhanakappu.' Under the garb of renovation, masons, who have little idea of history , paint temples and re-arrange stones carrying inscriptions with no regard for their continuity. At Senthalai temple in Tiruvaiyarure gion of Thanjavur, the masons who under took the work had thrown the order of inscriptions out of gear by not putting the stone blocks back where they originally belonged.
Trained epigraphists should revisit such renovated temples to ensure that the inscriptions in grantha and devanagiri scripts are in order.

In fact, the Archaeological Survey of India and the state archaeological department should jointly undertake a massive epigraphic project. A team should visit all temples in the state to ensure that inscriptions that have been already published are in order.
Such visits would also reveal hidden histories that have remained unknown so far.

(The author is a socio-political activist and writer)

Survey Shows 87% Wary Of Construction Quality

The survey carried out by Indiaproperty .com across several metros and smaller cities like Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Pune between July 9 and 14 said that about 87% of the respondents, out of a sample size of 899, were apprehensive about the quality of construction. Moreover, about 62% of people living in apartments face everyday issues like water seepage owing to low quality construction, said Ganesh Vasudevan, CEO of the portal.

The awareness about the Moulivakkam disaster was as high as 90% among the respondents though 58% of the people covered in the survey were from outside Tamil Nadu. A majority of the people felt it's not only small developers who do substandard work, but even some big builders who are guilty of such practices.

Reasons for poor quality construction, in public perception, ranged from corruption in the approval process to lack of adequate skilled workforce.
In the wake of raw material prices going up, builders and contractors compromised on quality to cut costs, people felt.
Builders also sublet work to multiple contractors to reduce overheads, they said.

About 40% of respondents were in the 25-35 age group and about 34% were above 46 years of age. Males accounted for 86% of the respondents.

In the wake of the disaster, Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority , the main planning agency in the city , had sought to save its skin by maintaining it was not its job to ensure structural stability of buildings. But the survey showed that the public have a different take on the issue.
About 43% held the government responsible for the builder not following the approved plan. Only 39% felt it was the job of the builder alone to conform to the approved design.

Stringent measures like continuous site inspections by approved engineers at various stages of construction, strengthening the regulatory agency to carry out frequent site inspections, speeding up investigation and trial in the building collapse case, prosecuting the builder and contractors for mass murder, imposing hefty penalty on builders for faulty construction and cancelling licence of such builders could rein in reckless builders, people felt. A majority of them (59%) said an independent certifying agency should be set up to check quality of construction.

Justice T Raja, upholding the April 17, 2012 circular and dismissing a batch of writ petitions against it, said, “If it is held that the registering authorities have no power to annul an earlier document, such an interpretation would lead to perilous implications harming public interest and public policy by allowing the fraudulent transactions to take place lavishly behind the back of innocent land owners.“ The judge was passing orders on writ petitions which challenged the legality of the circular and sought reversal of cancellations of registered documents by various registrars. They said the circular had set in motion an illegality and that it conferred omnibus powers upon registration officials any document on the basis of their own subjective satisfaction.

The circular also displaces the authority of civil and criminal courts in adjudicating disputed questions of title between rival claimants, thereby vests the judicial power in an executive authority .

The government justified the circular saying it was necessitated in view of the increase in landrelated crimes and that in many cases those affected had to sell properties for pittance.

Coimbatore Institution Did Not Get Nod For Constructing Buildings In Hill Region

The college management had not got DTCP approval to construct the buildings and did not have no-objection certificates from forest department and Hill Area Conservation Authority (HACA). The officials were asked to not to seal the academic buildings though all the structures are illegal.

The college has a girls’ hostel (two-storied building), a boys’ hostel, three academic blocks and a kitchen. The total constructed area covers 1.56 lakh sqft and the college is located on 17.45 acres.

After we get the forest department NOC, we will approach HACA for final approval. We have appointed special officers to get approval from DTCP,” said L Moorthy, public relations officer, Indus College of Engineering. He added that the college management had got approval from the local panchayat.

72 colleges get lock-and-seal notices

Coimbatore: The Directorate of Town and Country Planning (DTCP) has issued notices to 72 educational institutions in Coimbatore, Tirupur and Nilgiris districts for constructing buildings without approval and started lock and seal action. The buildings will be demolished if their owners do not get approval from the authority in 30 days. “A number of educational institutions do not have approval from DTCP. We are concerned about the students and so urge educational institutions to come forward to get approval immediately,“ said Archana Patnaik, collector, Coimbatore district.

Corporation officials are checking OSR data from Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority , the mayor said at a corporation council meet on Thursday.

According to CMDA rules, developers of complexes of 3,000sqm to 10,000sq m should set aside 10% of the land for parks or playgrounds and hand over gift deeds of the properties to the corporation through CMDA.

Duraisamy said data provided by the CMDA on OSR violations “will be placed in the next council meeting.“ “Between 1991 and 2006, the corporation set up 161 parks in the city and betweens 2006 and 2011 it set up 99 more,“ he said.

The mayor said several land owners violated OSR rules. The civic body will conduct a massive verification exercise to ensure such land is not encroached upon.

He said 100 parks were planned in 2012-13, of which 91 were completed. In 2013-14, the corporation proposed 100 parks and completed 28. Another 100 parks were proposed during 2014-15.

Construction activities are not permitted on OSR land but the corporation could consider amending the rules to set up civic offices on such land for the benefit of the public, the mayor said.

Sources say people are using OSR land for private purposes because lack of records prevents checks.

In 2012, CMDA reacquired two pieces of land in Kotturpuram and Saidapet and handed them over to the civic body but later got stuck in legal wrangles.

The civic body reacquired a 32-ground plot in Saidapet worth `45 crore to set up a school, but the original owner went to court and sold it while the ownership was being contested. The corporation retrieved the property after a deal with the new owner.