Recently, the government has launched an Alternative Investment Fund (AIF) in the real estate sector. In this context, consider the following statements regarding AIF:

1. AIFs are basically constituted for providing refinancing facility for real estate projects.

2. AIFs are aimed at financing stalled projects only.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

• The Alternative Investment Fund (AIF) is privately-pooled financial instruments, which are not regulated under the conventional regulation rules of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India or the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA).

• The examples of AIF include Hedge Funds; Angel Investor; Private Equity; Venture Capital Fund; Infrastructure Funds; Fund of Funds (Startup India), etc.

• SEBI, in 2012, provided for guidelines for the regulation of the Alternative Investment Funds in India.

• Accordingly, AIFs are established for a pre-defined purpose and shall not be utilized for giving loans (thus, not for refinancing).

• In a bid to revive the real estate sector, especially the affordable and middle-income housing projects, the government has decided to create an Alternative Investment Fund to provide last-mile funding to these stalled projects.

• The AIF is said to be created with the initial corpus of Rs. 25,000 crore, with government allocating Rs. 10,000 crore, and SBI (The State Bank of India), and LIC (The Life Insurance Corporation) contributing the rest.