This Supreme Court observation could provide great relief to home buyers

Home buyers have had to battle it out for a long time to get possession of the flats they paid for. Giving much relief to the disgruntled home buyers, the Supreme Court today observed it wanted to help these investors who must either get their flats or their money refunded by the builders.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra heard a plea by over 40 homebuyers of Jaypee Wish Town project at Noida in Uttar Pradesh who have challenged certain provisions of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016. The apex court, however, said it does not want to have more litigations in such matters. "We want to help the homebuyers but not litigation," the bench, also comprising Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud, said. "We want that homebuyers must get their flats or their money," the court said. The bench told petitioner's counsel Rashid Saeed that it has already appointed senior advocate Shekhar Naphade as an amicus curiae in the matter pertaining to the insolvency proceedings against real estate major Jaypee Infratech Ltd

It asked Saeed to file an application for impleadment as a party in the pending insolvency proceedings matter. The petitioner's counsel said these homebuyers had booked the flats in 2013 and were scheduled to get the possession las t year itself. He said the flats have not been handed over to these buyers despite the fact that they have paid bulk of the amount for the property. The apex court had on September 11 revived the insolvency proceedings against Jaypee Infratech Ltd and given its management control to the Interim Resolution Professional (IRP), appointed by the National Company Law Tribunal, with immediate effect. It had restrained the managing director and directors of the company from travelling abroad without permission and asked its parent company, Jaypee Associates, to deposit Rs 2,000 crore with the registry to safeguard the interest of the home buyers. The top court had also asked Jaypee Infratech to hand over the records to the IRP for drafting a resolution plan indicating protection of interests of over 32,000 hassled home buyers and creditors.