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The proposed Affordable Housing Fund (AHF) will not only cater to refinancing of housing finance companies, but also banks engaged in the affordable housing segment, Sriram Kalyanaraman, MD & CEO, National Housing Bank has said.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had on Thursday in his budget speech announced that Government will establish a dedicated AHF in NHB, funded from priority sector lending shortfall and fully serviced bonds authorised by the Central Government.
"This dedicated affordable housing fund will cater to both HFCs and banks so long as their end customers satisfy the criteria and belong to Economically weaker section and low and middle income groups", Kalyanaraman told BusinessLine here.
The size of this dedicated AHF is yet to be firmed up and is being worked out, he said.
BOOSTER DOSE
Budget 2018 has provided a huge booster dose for affordable housing, he said. It has allocated Rs 6,500 crore for Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana and this coupled with the internal budgetary resources generated from Housing Ministry will go long way to push housing development, he added.
Giving a fillip to rural housing is the proposal to hike MSP payouts for kharif crops, which is expected to improve the purchasing power for the farming community and thereby drive demand for rural housing, according to Kalyanaraman.
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