Real estate firm booked for cheating homebuyers by mortgaging their property

Real estate firm Ninex Developers Limited and its three directors have been booked for allegedly cheating at least 22 homebuyers of crores of rupees by mortgaging their units to a Delhi-based business group and securing a loan of ?30.39 crore from the group, police said. The victims have alleged that the real estate firm was involved in the construction of a township named Ninex City in Sector 76. An FIR was registered against the firm and its directors under sections 120B, 406 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code.

A real estate firm, Ninex Developers Limited, and its three directors were booked for allegedly cheating at least 22 homebuyers of crores of rupees by mortgaging their units to a Delhi based business group and securing a loan of ₹30.39 crore from the group, police said on Friday.

Real estate firm booked for cheating homebuyers by mortgaging their property

According to police, victims have alleged that the real estate firm was involved in the construction of a township named Ninex City in Sector 76. Most of the construction work has been completed and several buyers are residing there after taking possession of their properties.

However, developers allegedly coerced 22 buyers, including one Rajender Anand (74), a resident of Cameron Court in Sector 43, into entering into memorandums of understanding to use their properties for the company’s requirement and in case they were unable to hand these over to the firm, an amount equivalent to market rates would be returned to buyers, investigators said quoting the allegations.

Investigators said after getting the rights of the properties, Ninex mortgaged them to a large Delhi-based business group which is into 10 different fields including shipping, manufacturing, real estate, research and technology, education and others. Ninex also entered into a memorandum of understanding with the Delhi firm in 2018.

But later, the Delhi group came to know that the properties mortgaged with them were not of the builder but of homebuyers against which the loan of ₹30.39 crore was secured.It then got a case lodged with Delhi Police against the developers.

According to the police, the buyers tried to get back their money or property, but could not succeed in doing so.

Investigators said victims approached police with their complaint, but after no action was taken, several of them moved the court for getting an FIR registered against Ninex.

On Anand’s complaint, city court finally ordered the Gurugram police to book the firm and its three directors after which an FIR was registered against them under sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 420 (cheating) of Indian Penal Code at Sector-50 police station on Thursday night, said police.

Anand said he had booked a 4,549 square feet apartment for ₹1.4 crore in 2016 in the Sector 76, the present market value of which is almost ₹4 crore.

“By the end of that year, I paid ₹1.1 crore. Rest of the amount was to be paid at the time of registration and possession. However, the directors approached me for entering into an agreement in 2017 for using my property on the condition that either the firm will hand me over the property after completion or will pay me ₹3 crore within two years,” he said.

“However, neither I nor the 21 others got the money promised or the property for which we had paid the developer in 2016. We all have been running around since then to get the property or the money. When everything else failed, we moved the court,” he alleged.

An official of Ninex real estate firm said the firm is under corporate insolvency resolution process since July 25, 2019, under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016.

“Since then, all three directors of our firm are not handling the company affairs. An interim resolution professional, Vekas Kumar Garg, was appointed to look after the firm,” he said. Calls, messages and emails sent to Garg seeking his comment went unanswered.

Inspector Sandeep Kumar, station house officer of Sector 50 police station, said they will first collect all the records and documents from the court and the complainants. “Right now, we have just registered an FIR in the case and things will become clear after further investigation,” he said.