It’s DDA’s job to keep allottees informed

One worry less for you to lose sleep over: if you do not receive the demand-cum-allotment letter for your Delhi Development Authority flat, it's DDA's problem, reports Bhadra Sinha.

One worry less for you to lose sleep over: if you do not receive the demand-cum-allotment letter for your Delhi Development Authority (DDA) flat, it's DDA's problem.

HT Image

The Supreme Court has ruled that the Authority cannot cancel your allotment for your failure to act on its undelivered letters. The court has made it clear that the onus to prove the delivery of the letter to allottees lies with DDA.

Holding DDA guilty of unfair trade practice, a bench headed by Justice Altamas Kabir granted relief to petitioner V.N. Bharat, who had applied for a flat under the 1985 sixth self-financing housing registration scheme.

Bharat was allotted the flat in December 1991 at Dwarka. However, due to a communication error, he could not pay the final instalment amount of Rs 1.63 lakh to DDA, the last date for which was December 31, 1996.

Bharat claimed he had not received DDA’s final letter asking him to pay the balance. When DDA reissued the demand letter to him in June 1998, it increased the amount from Rs 1.63 lakh to Rs 4.43 lakh on the grounds that it had cancelled the earlier allotment.

It held that DDA had failed to prove the service of demand notice for the final instalment. Allowing Bharat’s plea, the court quashed DDA’s demand letter asking him to pay Rs 4.43 lakh and directed the Authority to give possession of the flat to him on the payment of Rs 1.63 lakh.