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SEBI rolled out REIT Regulations in September 2014 (“REIT Regulations”). Of the Grade A office space stock of over 500 msf in India, as per JLL Research, 294 mn sq. ft. of office space stock would be eligible for REIT in India. This would translate to potential investment of USD 35 bn.

Since each VPO is expected to conduct an examination of a member prior to issue of a certificate of practice, the Registration Authority may recognise the examination conducted by the VPO, dispensing with the need for the Valuation Examination in terms of Rule 5(1) (a) to be conducted by the Registration Authority.

The Finance Bill 2020 proposes to levy tax on the dividend paid by InvITs/ REITs to the unitholders in the hands of the unitholders, which was until this proposed amendment exempt from tax. An efficient tax structure provided under the Income Tax Act 1961 enabled the successful listing of two public InvITs in 2017, two privately placed but listed InvITs and India’s first REIT in April 2019 which attracted investment from large long-term foreign investors and also domestic institutional investors.