ED raids against Bengaluru group in homebuyers 'fraud' case

Bengaluru: The Enforcement Directorate on Friday conducted searches against a Bengaluru-based real estate company and its promoters who are accused of duping home buyers worth crores of rupees in the name of selling them flats in their residential project, official sources said.

At least ten premises of Ozone Urbana Developers Pvt. Ltd. and its key management personnel were raided in Bangalore and Mumbai under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), the sources said.

The main promoter of the group is Satyamoorthi Vasudevan.

The company and its promoters were booked by the ED after taking cognisance of multiple police FIRs registered against them related to a residential project named Ozone Urbana in Devanahalli Taluk of Bengaluru.

The integrated township project was to be handed over to buyers in 2018. However, till 2024, only 49 per cent of the project was completed, the sources said.

The company "failed" to hand over the project and has neither returned the money to the buyers, they claimed.

It is alleged that the accused company and its key management personnel "cheated" gullible home buyers by promising to pay their bank EMIs (taken for purchase of homes) until completion of the project.

The company also promised many buyers "huge" discounts, if they pay full amount in advance against the bookings and it also allegedly lured them with a "buyback scheme".

It is alleged that the directors of the said company cheated its buyers collectively to the tune of hundreds of crores and misappropriated the funds, the ED sources said.