NEW DELHI: Can there be two laws on one subject? The Union housing ministry has sought the opinion of law ministry after West Bengal notified its own Act to regulate real estate activities in the state. The Centre has already enacted the Real Estate Regulation Act ( RERA ) to protect home buyers and to weed out fraudulent and fly-by-night players in the sector.

“The state has submitted that the West Bengal Housing and Industrial Regulation Act (HIRA) is in sync with the Central Act and even the rules notified under the law are identical to the ones notified by us. To get clarity we have sought opinion of law ministry whether two laws on the same issue can be enforced. The West Bengal government has said that under their law, real estate is treated as an industry,” Union housing secretary D S Mishra said.

The home buyers associations have raised serious questions on the applicability of HIRA saying it may set a precedent for other states to enact their own laws and make RERA redundant.

“We saw how Uttar Pradesh government’s definition of ongoing projects resulted in many other states following the norm to keep most of the incomplete projects out of the ambit of RERA. The government had to fight a long legal battle to settle the issue. Why are we allowing any such thing to happen at all and creating a bigger problem?” asked Abhay Upadhyaya, national convenor of Fight for RERA, who is also a member of the Central Advisory Council of RERA.

Earlier in the day, Mishra told reporters that there is significant progress in the implementation of the real estate law. He said except West Bengal, six states from north-east and Jammu and Kashmir , all states have been implementing the provisions of RERA.

He added around 29,000 real estate projects have so far been registered under RERA while 22,600 real estate agents have registered themselves under the law.

