MUMBAI
MUMBAI: Housing regulator Maharashtra Real Estate Regulatory Authority on Wednesday said it has started serving a second showcause notice to 16,000 out of the 19,500 registered projects which have not responded to the first notice sent in January urging them to update the relevant information about their projects and its progress.
The Authority has warned the promoters of these projects that action in terms of penalties will be taken against the project if they do not respond to the second showcause notice within the next 15 days. MahaRERA has powers to impose 5 to 10% of the total project cost as penalty on violations of the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act (RERA).
“We had issued email notices to 19,500 projects. We have issued a second notice now to 16,000 projects who have either not responded at all or provided information which is not satisfactory. This will be their last chance to update the information about their project’s progress. It is essential that home buyers visiting the portal get clear information about these projects, their construction progress, their completion dates etc,” said a MahaRERA official.
The Authority had set up a close monitoring mechanism and appointed a retired IAS officer as the nodal officer to monitor projects and get their information updated. The exercise revealed that several projects had lapsed and not renewed their registration validity. The Authority also issued notices to 261 projects incuding more than half in Mumbai and Thane, which have less than 40 per cent work complete, but their completion dates are December 2023. The Authority has sought to know how these projects propose to complete these projects on time.
As per Section 11 of RERA, it is mandatory for promoters of ongoing projects to update their registration information including about construction progress, number of bookings, use of funds etc. It is also binding on promoters to update this information every quarter and provide six-monthly audit reports to the authority.