Kolkata: The West Bengal Real Estate Regulatory Authority (WBRERA) website, which had remained out of operation since Oct 1, has finally become functional again, bringing some relief to developers who had been unable to register new projects, upload statutory documents or launch sanctioned projects for nearly two months.“The situation is gradually returning to normal. Normal functioning resumed a couple of days ago,” said a source in the housing department. Sources said a call from a developer’s office prompted authorities to remove a notification on the site that had stated it was “out of order”.TOI reached out to WBRERA chairperson Jayanta Kumar Basu for a response but did not receive one.The disruption has left developers facing a backlog of compliance work. Several builders said they now have to upload a large volume of pending documents, including quarterly progress reports for ongoing projects. “WBRERA officials asked us to upload the project status up to Nov 17. Normally, we would have uploaded the July-Sept quarter status by Oct 7. We finally filed it on Nov 6, almost a month late,” said a developer.The website outage followed a massive malware attack on the Webel-controlled West Bengal State Data Centre between Sept 9 and Sept 13, which disrupted multiple state department websites from Sept 13. The malware reportedly remained active and undetected on the main server for five days. Websites linked to key services, including public works, housing, municipal affairs, urban development and state police, were affected. While most departments restored services within weeks, the WBRERA portal remained non-operational for nearly two months.The prolonged shutdown hit the real estate sector hard because RERA registration is mandatory before developers can advertise, market, sell or start construction of a project. Under RERA rules, developers must upload approvals and documents such as title reports, sanctioned building plans, clearances and project details before WBRERA issues a registration number. Without that number, even projects with sanctioned plans and other approvals in place cannot be launched publicly.Developers said the outage created uncertainty in project timelines and financial planning. Several said they had invested in land, approvals, architectural work and pre-launch preparations but were unable to move ahead because applications could not be filed. Marketing campaigns had to be deferred, sales teams remained idle and customer enquiries could not be converted into bookings.The delay also affected projects already under construction, as builders were unable to update mandatory quarterly progress reports on time. Developers said they feared technical non-compliance despite the delay being caused by the regulator’s own website.“RERA was supposed to be a watchdog agency for all stakeholders. It is supposed to check deficiencies on the part of others. But here, RERA itself was in trouble,” remarked a developer who had been unable to upload documents or apply for registration.With the portal now limping back to normal, developers expect WBRERA to clear pending applications and filings quickly to reduce the accumulated burden on the sector.
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