Regulatory Overlap and Market Access in Indian Real Estate: Analysing the Interface Between RERA and Competition Law

Abstract

The Indian real estate sector has undergone significant regulatory transformation with the enactment of the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 (RERA), which introduced a specialised framework aimed at enhancing transparency, accountability, and consumer protection in real estate transactions. Parallel to this sector-specific regulation, the Competition Act, 2002 governs market conduct by addressing anti-competitive agreements, abuse of dominant position, and practices causing appreciable adverse effects on competition. Although both legislative frameworks pursue distinct regulatory objectives, contemporary disputes in the real estate sector increasingly reveal substantial areas of interaction and jurisdictional overlap. Issues such as unfair contractual clauses, delayed possession, unilateral modification of project terms, discriminatory allotment, and exploitative market conduct frequently raise concerns capable of attracting scrutiny under both RERA and competition law.

This overlap raises a critical jurisprudential question: whether the coexistence of sectoral regulation and competition law represents regulatory complementarity or results in duplicative enforcement and jurisdictional uncertainty. Existing scholarship has largely examined RERA and competition law as independent legal regimes, with limited academic attention devoted to their doctrinal interaction, concurrent jurisdiction, and institutional boundaries within India’s real estate sector. This paper addresses that gap by critically examining the encounters and interactions between RERA and competition law with particular emphasis on conflict, complementarity, and concurrent regulation. Adopting doctrinal and comparative legal methodology, the study analyses statutory provisions, judicial precedents, decisions of the Competition Commission of India, and regulatory developments under RERA. The paper argues that RERA and competition law should not be viewed as mutually exclusive regulatory regimes but as complementary legal mechanisms addressing distinct yet interconnected market failures. It proposes a harmonised regulatory framework aimed at improving institutional coordination, reducing jurisdictional ambiguity, and strengthening regulatory efficiency in India’s evolving real estate market.