Infrastructure status for affordable housing was a long-standing requirement of the sector. This move should boost the volume of construction activity across the country, which has been struggling with reduction in the number of projects being launched over the last few quarters.

The announcement of infra status for the affordable housing segment in the Budget will open up new avenues for developers planning to offer budget housing units and will make it easy and comfortable for them to get finance from lending agencies.

The government has expressed the vision of 'Housing for all' by 2022, so in that sense the budget showcases a long-term vision. We are hoping that the government should articulate action plans that would follow their expressed intent. It was vastly anticipated that the budget would arrive at correcting the market drawbacks as a whole.

The 'Infrastructure' status to the affordable housing segment seems adequate to spur investments by the private sector with favourable outcomes as it opens up a plethora of avenues for the benefit of affordable housing.

With infrastructure, we expect the affordable housing segment to develop a new degree of velocity because the cost of capital is going to reduce and lenders are going to be motivated to invest money in this sector. Likewise, the tax status for development is beneficial with the infrastructure status.

The affordable housing sector is looking and feeling upbeat! The sector has been finally granted infrastructure status, in addition to interest rate subsidies through the PMAY scheme, the income-tax breaks have been extended effectively till 2024 and finally the government has moved the idea of providing regulatory and construction approvals within 60 days.

Industry sectors like housing, cement, et al have been clamouring to be allowed into the hallowed precincts of infrastructure for quite some time. Apart from the recognition of contributing to nation building, to be admitted as a member of the so called "Infrastructure Club" also offers the lure of easier financing norms.

It's early days for us. We have launched our operations in India last year. We said, let's not get the cart before the horse. Let's create a world-class delivery capability. So we have built that team and we are continuing to expand that team with quite an aggressive hiring programme. Now, more recently, we have been bringing on the sales, marketing and expertise.

The introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) is in itself a path-breaking fiscal reform. Corporate tax and other indirect taxes may be revamped keeping in view GST requirement.