Sink or die, investors need to be paid back: SC to Supertech

Supreme Court today gave a stern message to Supertech asking it to return money to investors saying it was not concerned whether the real estate major "sinks or dies", a direction which may soothe ruffled feathers of hassled home buyers waiting endlessly for their dream homes.

"Either you (Supertech) sink or die, we are not concerned. You will have to pay back the money to home buyers. We are least bothered about the financial status," a bench of Justices Dipak Misra and Adarsh Kumar Goel said when it was pointed out that some builders have said they had no funds to pay back the home buyers.

The apex court directed Supertech to pay 10 per cent per month of the invested amount from January 5, 2015 to 17 home buyers, who are before the court, within four weeks.

It said the real estate firm has to clear the arrears to the home buyers in four weeks, which can be adjusted and asked Supertech to furnish a chart of payments made to 17 of them on the next date of hearing.

Senior advocate Rajeev Dhawan, appearing for Supertech, said the apex court "cannot act like a banker" and has to follow principle of equality.

"Not all home buyers are against us and some of them have even supported the firm and filed an appeal against the High Court order," he said, adding "there is a difference between Unitech's case and us. They did not have a building while we have a building and funds invested with us have been used for construction of structure."

He said a total of 628 people had approached the company, of whom 274 have sought alternate arrangements, 74 asked for re-investment and 108 have sought refund.
To this, the bench asked why Supertech was not giving back the money to all the investors.

Dhawan said there was a court order saying only those who have applied on time will get the money back and it was paying back the money to them. Counsels for home buyers refuted Supertech's claim and said they were not getting the money on time.