The Allahabad High Court has dismissed the petition challenging the jurisdiction to hear and order by the Real State Regulatory Authority (RERA) in case the promoter fails to provide the flat to the customers by completing the project on time.
The court said that the promoter applied for the certificate of completion of the building without completing all the development works of the building. By doing so, he does not get out of the jurisdiction of Rera. The court termed the order given by RERA to the promoter to give possession to the purchasers in 60 days and to pay the delay interest under the jurisdiction.
This decision was delivered by a bench of Justice SP Kesarwani and Justice YK Srivastava while dismissing the petition of Gautam Budh Nagar Paramount Prop Build Private Limited. The Yachty Company started the project under the name Paramount Golf Forest. He issued the allotment letter on 10 August 2011 to the buyers. If the project could not be completed on time, more than 50 buyers filed complaints with RERA. Rera found that there was a delay of more than four years in the completion of the project.
In addition to the available documentary evidence, RERA instructed the promoter to hand over the possession in 60 days and pay interest to the buyers for the delay, based on their report after physical inspection by technical experts. The order was challenged saying that Yachty’s project is not an incomplete project (on going). The petitioner has applied to the competent authority for issuing the completion certificate. Therefore, it does not come under the purview of Section 2 (h) of the RERA Act 2016.
In such a situation, Rera has no jurisdiction to hear the complaint against him. Section 2 (h) provides that building projects which are incomplete at the time of enactment of the Act in 2016 will also have to be registered under RERA and they will be within the purview of the Act.
The court said that RERA has found in physical verification that the project work is still not completed and all necessary services could not be provided. The task of taking NOCs from many departments including fire fighting has also not been completed. In such a situation, it is right to consider it as an ongoing project. The court said that in this situation the project cannot be considered outside the purview of Section 2 (h). Rera has jurisdiction to hear and there is no illegality in his order.
