The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) is working on a National Urban Rental Housing Policy (NURHP) to make up for housing shortage in urban areas by encouraging renting of homes even as millions of houses lie vacant across the country.
The draft Act is an attempt by the MoHUA to help make the rental policy more accommodative of both the tenant as well as the landlord’s needs.
According to a report, 27.5 per cent of urban residents are living in rented houses in the country. Daman & Diu, Sikkim, and Dadra & Nagar Haveli are among the top in the list where more than 60 per cent residents are in rented accommodations. Goa, Karnataka, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Chandigarh and Arunachal Pradesh are among those States and Union Territories, where 40 per cent and above residents are on rented houses.
In a written reply to a question in the lok Sabha, Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday said, “Since land and colonisation are State subjects, the matter relating to eviction of tenants by landlords comes under the purview of the rental laws/bye-laws of States and Union Territories. However, in order to create a vibrant, sustainable and inclusive rental housing market in the country, the Ministry is preparing a national urban housing policy.”
When asked, MoHUA officials said the Ministry is ready with the draft of a national policy on rental housing in urban area. As per the draft, the rental policy will supplement the “Housing for All” mission, under which 20 million houses are to be built by 2022.
The draft policy has two components: social rental housing for urban poor and market driven rental housing.
Officials said social rental housing is targeted at the economically weaker sections, low-income groups as well as the section defined as “tenants by constraint” which includes the urban poor belonging to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and other backward classes, migrants, transgenders and senior citizen.
Few States and Union Territories such as Chandigarh, Chhattisgarh and Gujarat have their own rental housing policies. In the national Capital, the Delhi Rent Control Act is yet to be implemented.