A district consumer commission, in a series of directives, has ordered two builders to give Kandivali residents flat with all amenities free of cost, corpus fund, security deposit and rent of ₹9,000 from December 2012 till the date of handover of flat in new building and ₹25,000 towards mental agony. A separate compensation towards litigation cost was directed to the builders and society the complainant belonged to.
Vinayak Developers undertook redevelopment of Manju Palace
The order dated February 27 (uploaded recently) was passed by Preethi Chamikutty and Shraddha Jalnapurkar, members of the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Mumbai Suburban on a complaint by Kandivali residents Deepali Hamlai and Jayant Hamlai against M/s Vinayak Developers, Manju Palace Co-operative Housing Society Ltd. and M/s. ESSD Infratech LLP. Vinayak undertook redevelopment of Manju Palace of which Hamlais are members that was later given to ESSD.
In February 2003, Hamlais purchased a flat in Manju Palace. In 2010, the society decided to go in for redevelopment but Hamlais found no transparency in the process. The redevelopment agreement promised to give each member free permanent alternate accommodation in new building, rent of ₹9,000 per month, ₹50,000 towards security deposit and ₹65,000 corpus fund. A copy of the redevelopment agreement was not provided to Jayant Hamlai and no individual agreement was entered by the developer with each of the complainants.
Building was demolished without complainant's consent
One fine day, the building was demolished including the flat in which Hamlais stayed without their consent and the latter filed a police complaint. When the matter reached commission, society did not file any reply while Vinayak rejected all allegations of Hamlais. They said that the Hamlais were not cooperative and did not attend meetings, did not take the corpus and security deposit, they waited for nearly two years for the building to demolish whose demolition happened after notice from BMC and that the Hamlais were not consumers of theirs as there was no agreement between them.
During the hearing, the commission stated that even though there was no direct agreement, since Hamlais were members of the society, they automatically became consumers of developers. It stated that there was no proof that an attempt was made to give corpus, deposit and rent. The commission instead stated that the agreement was not provided and since the project re-started only recently, there was delay in the construction and complainants be given agreement and amenities besides other benefits.
On ESSD, the commission stated that there was no proof of it being part of redevelopment but since notice was served and they did not turn up, they were aware of the proceedings and were made party to the case with an ex-parte order against them.
