In a big relief to flat buyers, the Supreme Court on Friday directed real estate major Unitech to compensate the flat buyers in its Burgundy Society in Noida by August 12. The court asked Unitech to pay the interim compensation of `5 crore by the said date and warned that any default on payment will land its Directors in jail.
The harsh words from the Court came on a petition filed by Unitech against the order passed by the National Consumer Dispute Redressal Commission (NCDRC) ruling in favour of three flat buyers who were denied possession of their flats for the past three years. The bench of Justices Dipak Misra and C Nagappan directed Unitech ltd to deposit the amount with the Court Registry.
The order of the National Consumer forum was passed on October 12, 2015 directing payment of Rs five crore compensation towards the delay and the litigation costs borne by the consumers was seen as a bold step to ensure real estate giants deter from delaying in handing over the dream home of lakhs of flat buyers. The Burgundy Society is situated in Sector 96 of Noida in Uttar Pradesh. The consumer forum even directed Unitech to hand over possession of the flats booked by the consumers before October 31, 2017.
The complainants had moved the commission alleging that despite having paid more than 95 per cent of the agreed sale consideration to the real-estate major, the possession of the flats have not been offered to them and the construction was “still far from complete”.
Advocate Ashwarya Sinha, appearing for the consumers, said the possession fell due on April 16, 2013 for which a payment of Rs 3.8 crore per flat was already received by Unitech ltd.
On May 9, the apex court had directed Unitech to deposit the amount by June 10, 2016 and said “the amount so deposited shall be kept in a short term fixed deposit in the UCO Bank, Supreme Court Compound, New Delhi so that interest can be accrued on the same”. later, the firm sought extension of time for depositing the amount.