'Housing for All' Priority for CREDAI

AHMEDABAD: Jaxay Shah, the newly appointed President of the Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Association of India (CREDAI) reiterated CREDAI’s pledge of “Housing for All” by committing to an investment of over Rs 70,000-crore in 375 plus new affordable housing projects through its member developers under its various State and City Chapters.

The "Housing for All" project was inaugurated today by Union Minister for Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation M Venkaiah Naidu at the Investiture Ceremony of the CREDAI’s new team at Ahmedabad.

The event was also attended by Gujarat Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel and Gujarat Minister for Environment and Urban Development Shankarbhai Chaudhry.

These projects are spread across all over India and involve development of over 8.60 crore sq ft of land and 20.60 crore plus sq ft of construction to build a total of 237000 plus houses. The investment involved in these projects is Rs 70,000+ crores.

CREDAI is in dialogue with State Bank of India (SBI), its national banking partner to create special financial package both for home loans and for construction finance.

At the event Jaxay Shah presented Mr Naidu a manifesto for the term 2017-2019. The 50-page manifesto, details CREDAI’s initiatives in the Skill development, Waste Management and the social agenda of CREDAI.

Mr Shah said, “We are all set to embark on a journey of a ‘Naya Daur’ for the real estate industry against the backdrop of introduction of various policy reforms which are aimed at facilitating growth. This presents a huge opportunity not just for our members or our industry, but for the nation itself. India has a recorded shortage of 20 million homes and our endeavor is to ensure that we overcome this shortage by placing consumers at the center of all our efforts. Our 375 housing schemes will realize the dreams of millions of Indians who are waiting to own a house.”

CREDAI with his skilling partner PNB Housing Finance Limited (PNBHFL) has entered into a MoU for skilling of 8000 construction workers during 2017-18.

Apart from On-site skilling at construction sites, CREDAI has also started skilling of unemployed youth by setting up off-site skill training centers in places from where labour is traditionally sourced. The first such centres have been set up in Murshidabad and Medinipur in Bengal, Nashik in Maharashtra, Vijayawada in Andhra and Bhiwadi in the NCR region. CREDAI is exploring the possibility of setting up more such centres in the states of Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, and places like Dahod in Gujarat, and Gulbarga in Karnataka.

The Centre for Entrepreneurship Development (CED), Government of Gujarat also approved CREDAI’s proposal to skill unemployed youth in construction related trades with an aim to make them employable and also to undertake on-site skill upgradation programs for construction workers in Gujarat.