NEW DELHI: A day after the Supreme Court asked the government to consider taking over of beleaguered realty firm Unitech Group and complete its pending housing projects, the Centre on Friday said it will consider hiring consultants to find out ways to protect home buyers’ interest.
“We are yet to see the fine print of the judgment. As far as taking over the company is concerned, that is the domain of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs. We will certainly look into how we can resolve the issue. If required, we can consider taking the help of local authorities and private builders,” an official from the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs told TNIE.
On Thursday, a bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and M R Shah said that it is the obligation of the government to protect its citizens who have invested their hard-earned money into buying flats, but got cheated by builders. Around 16,000 home buyers were affected by the Unitech’s pending projects. “We are answerable to home buyers, who look at us with expectation on how we are going to protect their interest. We will ask the government to take over the group’s management. There are responsible government undertakings that will take over the group and complete the construction. The government is obliged to protect the buyers,” SC said.
A similar order was given by Supreme Court on Wednesday in case of Amrapali Group, where it said that ownership of the group’s various housing projects would be handed over to Noida and Greater Noida authorities, who will complete construction and hand over the flats to buyers.
However, according to a PTI report, the Noida and Greater Noida authorities told the court on Friday that they do not have requisite resources to finish the projects of the embattled group.