The Centre and the Jammu & Kashmir administration on Monday held a real estate summit to encourage people from across the country to buy land or a second home in the union territory.
During the summit, the J&K administration opened the union territory to the country's real estate investors by signing 39 MoUs worth Rs 18,300 crore for the development of housing and commercial projects.
Terming the signing of the MoUs "historic'' in Jammu, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha said it is a major step towards transformation of the UT.
Addressing a press conference at the summit, he said the government has already implemented the realty law RERA and adopted Model Tenancy Act in the UT.
He emphasised that the government will consider reducing stamp duty on registration of properties and set up a single-window system for faster approval of projects.
"We have signed 39 MoUs today. We have received investments proposals of Rs 18,300 crore," he told reporters.
The summit was organised by the J&K government, Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs and realtors' body NAREDCO.
Sinha said these MoUs will help generate direct and indirect employment opportunities in J&K. He also announced that a similar real estate summit will be held in Srinagar on May 21-22 next year.
Meanwhile, this has not gone down well with the regional political parties.
Former chief ministers Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah accused the Centre for "putting up J&K up for sale".
"J&Ks special status was illegally revoked to dehumanise, dispossess & disempower the only muslim majority state in India.GOIs brazen loot & sale of our resources shows that the sole motive is to annihilate our identity & change the demography," tweeted Mehbooba Mufti.
"Once again the true intentions of the government are brought to the fore.While offering to secure the land, jobs, domicile laws & identity of the people of Ladakh,J&K is being put up for sale.People of Jammu should beware,“investors” will buy up land in Jammu long before Kashmir," Omar Abdullah wrote.
(With PTI inputs)
