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NRI investment in housing 'woefully inadequate': Minister

Urban Development Minister Ram Jethmalani said the investments from non-resident Indians in the housing sector during the past five years had been woefully inadequate.

The NRI investment in the sector was hardly Rs 3.65 billion during the last few years as against the requirement of Rs 1,500 billion, he said.

The minister also said that a comprehensive national housing policy was on the anvil.

Responding to supplementaries in the Lok Sabha today, Jethmalani said the Cabinet was to clear the housing policy yesterday but could not meet since the government was busy with relief operations in the cyclone-affected areas of Gujarat.

Government allocation to this sector in the current Budget is Rs 1.31 billion,, but the ministry has set an ambitious target of constructing 700,000 houses during the current year, he said.

Jethmalani said present laws did not allow foreign direct investment in the housing sector.

Recently the Singapore government evinced interest to invest in the housing sector but was told to set up an NRI front. The Singapore government rejected the offer and consequently the investment could not take place.

Maintaining that no final decision had been taken on FDI investment, he said the government was thinking of a five-year lock-in period for such investment as against the three-year lock-in period stipulated for the NRIs, to secure national interests.

Jethmalani and Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Laloo Prasad Yadav were locked in heated exchages with the latter charging the government with depending on foreign investment for providing housing to the poor.

UNI