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Cheating homebuyers: FIRs against Cong MLA’s realty firms transferred to ACB
The FIRs, at least nine, were registered by the Gurugram police between 2021 and 2023 for cheating, forgery, disappearance of evidence and contravention of provisions of the Haryana Development and Regulation of Urban Areas Act and conditions of real estate development license. Homebuyers are up in arms, holding protests for more than a year now, against the developer company for failing to deliver possession of houses and harming their investments.
Multiple first information reports (FIRs) registered by Gurugram police against real estate development companies controlled by Congress MLA, Dharam Singh Chhokar have been assigned to the Haryana anti-corruption bureau (ACB) for investigations by the state government.
The FIRs, at least nine, were registered by the Gurugram police between 2021 and 2023 for cheating, forgery, disappearance of evidence and contravention of provisions of the Haryana Development and Regulation of Urban Areas Act and conditions of real estate development license. Homebuyers are up in arms, holding protests for more than a year now, against the developer company for failing to deliver possession of houses and harming their investments.
Orders of the state government transferring the investigations of the nine criminal cases against the real estate conglomerate from Gurugram Police Commissionerate to the ACB were issued last week.
Officials said that since the cases pertained to economic offences, and dealt with land revenue and financial matters, the state government decided to transfer the investigations to the ACB which is probably better equipped to handle them.
‘Group companies contravened on many occasions’
The group of companies - Mahira Homes, Sai Aaina Farms, Czar Buildwell, all controlled by the Congress MLA, were granted real estate development licenses for building affordable group housing colonies in Gurugram’s various sectors. However, after a series of violations, illegalities and contraventions came to light, the town and country planning department (TCPD) ordered registration of criminal cases against the companies and once even blacklisted the firms.
In one of its initial contraventions, Sai Aaina Farms Pvt Ltd allegedly submitted fake bank guarantees to facilitate issuance of an affordable group housing license (number 106 of 2017). In another case, Mahira Homes submitted forged and fabricated building plans showing the signatures of members of the building plan approval committee. “The act of the coloniser is purely a case of cheating and fraud and breach of trust with the department. The coloniser has earlier done similar practices by submitting forged bank guarantees in other licenses (license number 128 of 2019, 24 of 2020, 106 of 2017 and 61 of 2021) and resultantly was blacklisted by the department on May 9, 2022. However, the coloniser has neither improved its conduct nor stopped doing wrong practices. In view of violations, it is ordered not to process any license application or approvals of Mahira Homes Pvt Ltd and its subsidiary/associate companies and its directors who have not improved their practices of submitting the forged documents to the department,’’ said a 2023 TCPD order.
The department also ordered that an FIR be lodged against the coloniser, its directors, associate companies, authorised signatory and the architect who submitted the forged plans to the Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority in respect of license number 9 of 2022 for 6.675 acres and additional license number 61 of 2023 for 3.40 acres.
ED found siphoning of home buyers’ money
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) which is probing the money laundering aspect had in 2023 conducted search operations at multiple locations in Delhi, Gurugram and Samalkha in Panipat belonging to Sai Aaina Farms, now known as Mahira Infratech, and other group companies of Mahira Group. ED officials said that investigations showed that promoters of Mahira Group siphoned off about ₹107.5 crore from another group company, Sai Aaina Farms.
The money belonged to home buyers of a housing project in sector 68 of Gurugram. The siphoning off was done showing fake expenses to the extent of ₹57 crore and loans to group entities to the extent of about ₹50 crore, the ED said in a statement. Freezing orders in respect of offices and bank accounts of Mahira Group were issued during the search operations.
The central agency said that investigations revealed that the company siphoned off home-buyers money by booking fake construction expenditure in group entities. The ED also found during investigations that several personal family expenses were also booked as construction and business expenditure in group entities.
The central agency had initiated a money laundering probe based on the FIRs registered by the Gurugram police against Sai Aaina Farms Pvt Ltd for alleged cheating and forgery.
“Sai Aaina Farms Pvt Ltd had collected about ₹360 crore from 1,497 home buyers under the affordable housing scheme on the promise of providing houses at sector 68, Gurugram. However, they failed to deliver the houses and missed multiple deadlines,’’ the ED said.
