Noida Twin Towers Demolition: Buyers Feel Cheated Again After Swapping Flats For Supertech’s Other Projects

Last year, when the Supreme Court upheld the Allahabad High Court order of the demolition of Supertech twin towers in Noida’s Sector 93, Dharmendra Singh, who had bought a flat in one of the two towers in 2009, chose to go for the swapping option instead of taking a monetary refund.

Supertech then offered him a plot in the Golf Country, one of its premium projects spread over 100 acres along the Yamuna Expressway. The catch? Singh says that the builder does not even have permission to allow plot owners to construct their homes there.

“I can neither sell it to anyone nor construct a house on the plot. So, I am stuck. Whenever I speak with the company, they say they will get a completion certificate very soon,” he says.

It has been a year since then and nothing has happened, he says. "Kagaz leke bhatak raha hoon main ek jagah se dusri jagah nyay ki umeed lagaye. (I am running from pillar to post with a piece of paper in hope of justice),” says a distressed Singh. 

Singh is not the only buyer who got a raw deal from the builder. Weeks after its historic demolition, a section of buyers of the Supertech twin towers, who had swapped their flats for other projects of the same builder, is facing a new set of challenges. 

Some buyers allege that just like the twin towers, Supertech has compromised with building norms in those projects as well. Following that, the Noida Authority has not issued them the completion certificate, a safety certificate issued by a development authority ensuring that the building complies with all the required safety norms.

Normally, when a development authority finds out that a builder has carried out construction that is in violation of the sanctioned building plan or has compromised with the safety aspects, it withholds the completion certification till the time it is rectified. For the want of the said certificate, buyers can neither get the registration of the flat done in their name nor can they sell it off to anyone.

In Supertech’s case, these buyers are so helpless that they cannot even go for legal remedy because the company is under insolvency proceedings and as per the insolvency law, during this time, no legal case can be filed against the company.

Systemic Apathy

Like Singh, K.K. Mittal, a Delhi-based chartered accountant, had bought an apartment in the Apex tower, one of the Supertech twin towers, in May 2009 by paying the full amount as down payment.

In 2014, after the Allahabad High Court’s order on demolition, Mittal joined a group of buyers who wanted an apartment in another project.  

“I swapped my Apex flat with an apartment in Supertech 34 Pavilion, a residential project in Sector 34 in Noida. There are several towers in the project and mine is called Azure Heights,” says Mittal.

He says that the builder assured him about the project having all the approvals in place. “But more than six years have gone by. Later on, I realized that it did not have a completion certificate from the Noida Authority.”

Mittal says that many people have taken physical possession of the flats but he is waiting for formal approval from the authority. Though it is illegal to occupy a flat in a residential tower which does not have a completion certificate, such violations are rampant in several places in Delhi NCR.  

“I did my level best to find out why the Noida Authority has not issued a completion certificate but I have not been able to do so as the authority is not ready to share the information. I visited the authority office, waited for hours but to no avail,” rues a frustrated Mittal.  

Several of his applications filed with the Noida Authority under the Right To Information Act have fallen on deaf ears and not served any purpose as the authority has failed to reveal the reason for not issuing the said certificate.

Trust Issues 

Many buyers say that the twin towers have gone but their problems persist with no solution in sight. 

One of the 54 buyers, the first lot that got a refund around 2014-15, says that every buyer had two options—either to get a refund with a 12 per cent interest or get a flat in another project. Many of them trusted the builder and went for the swap option.

“As per my knowledge, as I am in touch with many of them, most of them are facing one problem or the other. Some have issues related to the quality of construction, while many others feel that they did not get flats of equal value since Sector 93 is a prime location and the flats that they got are in other far-flung areas,” says the buyer, requesting anonymity.    

According to the Supreme Court order dated August 31, 2021, the twin towers had a total of 915 flats out of which 633 were booked. Till that time, 133 buyers had reinvested in other projects of the developer, 248 had received the refund and 252 remained committed to the same project, hoping that it would get a favorable judgment from the court. 

Today, 59 buyers are still awaiting their refund. On August 26, just two days before the demolition was carried out, the Supreme Court assured these buyers that they would get the full refund with interest. It also asked the Insolvency Resolution Professional (IRP) of Supertech to deposit Rs 1 crore in the Supreme Court registry before September 30, 2022.

However, many buyers say that the court has not fixed any deadline for their refund. Since the builder is facing insolvency proceedings, their only concern is that if the builder goes bankrupt, even the courts cannot do anything.

Outlook wrote to Hitesh Goel, the IRP of Supertech, for his comment on the legal status of Supertech's projects but did not get a response till the time this article was published.