Haryana real estate regulator imposes Rs 12 lakh fine on ISH Realtors for licence norm violation

The Haryana real estate regulatory authority (HRERA) on Wednesday imposed a penalty of Rs 12 lakh on ISH Realtors for selling properties in a commercial project without obtaining licence from the concerned department.

The DTCP (Department of Town and Country Planing) had issued licence in favour of seven landowners in collaboration with Jitender Jhangu for development of the commercial project on a land measuring 3.7187 acres falling in the revenue estate of village Pawal Khusurpur, Sector 109, Gurugram. It is an on-going project and had to be registered with the RERA which came into existence in 2017 in Haryana.

''Our aim is to safeguard the interest of allottees who have invested their hard- earned money in the project that is why we have issued show-cause notices to licencees, landowners and collaborators after taking suo moto cognizance of the offence,'' said K K Khandelwal, chairman of RERA.

In a statement RERA said, the authority observed no mention of ISH Realtors as collaborator anywhere in any record in the licence, yet it sold units and collected money from buyers in violation of RERA which took cognizance of offence in July.

The penalty of Rs 12 lakh has been imposed after the authority observed negligence in complying with the necessary documents that ISH Realtors was asked to submit to the authority for a scrutiny in order to complete the registration process.

The ISH Realtors representatives failed to produce the BIP permission certificate before RERA during the hearing on Tuesday. BIP certificate is a document without which the company was not supposed to engage in any sale-purchase of the commercial spaces at its construction site in Sector 109, Gurugram.

While hearing the matter for the first time in July, the authority on the request of the company had granted two months time to ISH Realtors to apply for the RERA registration and obtain the registration certificate (RC) by completing formalities. The company representatives requested for a second moratorium on which the authority agreed to grant a week's time.

''A week time is being granted to ISH Realtors to complete deficient documents failing which it would be considered a repeated offence and a criminal procedure will be initiated,'' the authority noted while seeking the additional details of directors and shareholders of the company as well to examine the case more rigorously.

The authority, meanwhile, has restrained the ISH Realtors to withdraw any money/amount from any bank accounts where the allottees' money was realised and deposited or further transferred in any other bank accounts in respect of the sale/allotment/booking/provisional allotment of any units in the project.

The authority issued directions to freeze the bank account in the name of the ISH Realtors Private Limited at IndusInd Bank, Defence Colony, New Delhi, or if any other account held by the directors of the company or the landowners where the amount realised from the buyers-cum-complainants are alleged to have been deposited.

In July, Pushpender Singh Rajpurohit, director of Univer Solution Private Limited, had filed a complaint with RERA of cheating against ISH Realtors Private Limited.

Rajpurohit claimed he purchased super area space of 12,286 square feet from ISH Realtors at the rate of Rs 6,300 per square feet and paid Rs 2.02 crore in advance.

''Despite having received a substantial amount, neither any construction was raised at the site nor any development work was carried out by the developer/promoter,'' said Rajpurohit in his complaint.

It was found by the authority that the project which was advertised, developed and sold was not registered.

''This is a blatant violation of Section 3 (1) of the Act and civil imprisonment can also happen if it fails to authority's scrutiny,'' Khandelwal said.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)