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The Orissa High Court has recently demanded a response from the Odisha Real Estate Regulatory Authority (ORERA) regarding new allegations of failure to recover money from builders in disputes concerning the delivery of possession and handover of flats to homebuyers. This development came about during the hearing of a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) that sought intervention against ORERA for allegedly neglecting to execute the court's orders for money recovery in such disputes.
The petitioner, Bimalendu Pradhan, a flat owner from Bhubaneswar, filed the PIL. On Wednesday, Pradhan's counsel, Mohit Agarwal, presented an additional affidavit to the court, which was based on information obtained through the Right to Information (RTI) Act. According to the affidavit, the office of the additional district magistrate (ADM) in Khurda has received 53 cases related to money recovery, but no progress has been made in any of these cases.
Chief Justice S Muralidhar and Justice Gourishankar Satapathy, the two judges presiding over the case, acknowledged the petitioner's additional affidavit, which provided detailed information about the cases. They scheduled the next hearing for July 27 and granted ORERA the opportunity to file a response.
ORERA had sent these 53 cases, each involving a recovery amount of Rs 25 lakh, to the collector of Khurda, who acts as the authority under the Odisha Public Demand Recovery Act, 1962. In Pradhan's affidavit, it was revealed that ORERA has sent a total of 128 cases to collectors or civil courts for money recovery. The affidavit further noted that the civil courts have begun returning these cases to ORERA, and only a negligible amount has been recovered in terms of penalties imposed on promoters by ORERA.
The High Court had previously requested ORERA to submit a status report on 62 cases related to money recovery. In an affidavit submitted on Wednesday, ORERA Secretary Bijay Kumar Prusty stated that out of the 62 cases, 57 have been forwarded to Khurda district authorities under the OPDR Act for the recovery process.
It is noteworthy that ORERA and the state government had previously acknowledged the authority's lack of necessary mechanisms to handle disputes raised by flat and apartment buyers. ORERA stated in an affidavit that it does not possess the means to enforce orders, such as the attachment of movable and immovable property, unlike the civil courts. The affidavit highlighted the need for a fully equipped infrastructure, including an adequate number of process servers, which ORERA currently lacks.
The state government supported ORERA's decision to send orders to the civil court, stating that creating parallel infrastructure within ORERA for order execution would impose unnecessary financial burdens on the state exchequer. Instead, they argued that it is appropriate and lawful for ORERA to forward orders to the civil court within the local jurisdiction of the project or the individual against whom the order is issued.
In conclusion, the Orissa High Court has demanded an explanation from ORERA regarding the alleged failure to recover money from builders in disputes related to possession and handover of flats. The court has given ORERA time to respond and has scheduled further hearings. Meanwhile, there is an ongoing debate about the authority's lack of infrastructure and mechanisms to execute orders, leading to the reliance on civil courts for enforcement.
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