ED initiates restitution of flats worth over Rs 20 cr to 'cheated' Gurugram homebuyers

New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate has initiated the process of restitution of flats worth more than Rs 20 crore to homebuyers of a Gurugram realty project who were allegedly cheated by the builder company, official sources said Wednesday.

The case pertains to flats constructed by the SRS Group as part of projects like SRS Pearl, SRS City and SRS Prime.

The process to restitute 78 flats of genuine homebuyers in these SRS projects has been initiated following the Appellate Tribunal, instituted under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), issuing an order on August 12 allowing the ED to return these flats worth a total Rs 20.15 crore to their rightful claimants.

The central agency in January 2020 had provisionally attached assets worth Rs 2,215 crore as part of a money laundering investigation against the SRS Group of companies in a case related to alleged fraud committed against a number of homebuyers and investors.

It was alleged by the ED that the SRS group of companies received payments from homebuyers for residential units but "failed" to register these properties in the name of the respective homebuyers.

The attached properties were registered in the name of SRS Group and this attachment was "partially confirmed" by the Adjudicating Authority of the PMLA. The ED appealed against this order before the Appellate Tribunal of the said law.

The case later went to the Punjab and Haryana High Court and the Supreme Court who, as per the sources, directed the agency to conduct a comprehensive verification of the genuine homebuyers or claimants so that their flats can be restituted.

The ED, official sources said, undertook a "thorough verification process to ensure justice and issued no objection certificates (NOCs) for the registration of the restituted properties to genuine homebuyers." The verification of more homebuyers who had booked flats in SRS Group projects but did not get possession is ongoing and they will similarly be restituted, the sources said.

A similar restitution of assets, worth Rs 12 crore, was recently ordered by a Kolkata-based special PMLA court for the investors who were duped in an alleged Ponzi fraud orchestrated by the Rose Valley group promoted by Gautam Kundu.

The ED has earlier restituted assets to the banks in two cases-- the alleged loan fraud case against liquor businessman Vijay Mallya and the one against diamantaire Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi. Assets worth more than Rs 15,000 crore have been restituted in these two cases to the public sector banks.

The process to restitute the assets of innocent investors is undertaken under section 8(8) of the PMLA that says that if a property has been confiscated by the central government (by the ED under the PMLA), the special court (or higher courts) have the power to direct restoration of the confiscated property to a claimant who has a legitimate interest in the property and has suffered a quantifiable loss as a result of an offence of money laundering.