BHUBANESWAR: In a bid to attract investments in the Covid-hit real estate sector, the State Government on Friday announced major reforms in building norms by doing away with multiple regulations by different development authorities.
The Odisha Development Authorities (Planning and Building Standards) Rules, 2020, notified today, also aims at encouraging affordable housing through vertical constructions in urban areas while luring private investors with incentives.
H&UD Minister Pratap Jena said main objective is to encourage large-scale investments in the real estate sector and address concerns of all the segments of urban population. “The reforms are aimed at bringing uniformity in building norms and procedures and do away with multiple regulations notified by different development authorities,” Jena said and added, the department will soon introduce a common online platform for building plan approval throughout the State.
Under the new rules, norms have been relaxed for almost all the categories of buildings. The restriction of maximum floor area ratio (FAR) on low risk buildings has been removed and 108 pre-approved designs for such constructions made available, which will reduce dependency of people on architects and planning authorities. The building plans will also get approved almost instantly.
Norms related to approach road, parking among other things have been relaxed to attract more investment in the housing sector.
However, what is most significant is the amendment of the Policy for Housing for All in Urban Areas - 2015, which is going to attract more private partners to collaborate with Government for construction of affordable houses for people in economically weaker section (EWS) and low income groups (LIG) categories, the Minister said.
Simplification of rules will now make construction of houses and obtaining occupancy certificates easier than before.
Under the new rules, the limits of maximum FAR has been raised up to seven, which is the highest in the country. The rate of purchasable FAR has been reduced to half. Provisions have also been made for development of commercial use in the residential buildings.
The rules also allow private developers to get 60 per cent of the project land on a freehold and free of cost basis for developing affordable housing over 40 per cent of the project area.Besides, 20 per cent of all plotted developments will have to provide for EWS and LIG categories.
