Anhad Law, Solicitors & Advocates (IRG’s exclusive member for Real Estate in India), is pleased to share that its Partner, Dhruv Gandhi (Partner-Real Estate & Dispute Resolution) represented a real estate developer namely ‘La-Residentia’ before the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, in a batch of civil writ petitions filed in the proceedings underway involving defiled real estate developer ‘Amrapali Group’ (including all subsidiaries and group companies), in the underlying Writ Petition (Civil) No. 940/2017.
On June 29, 2021, the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India delivered its final judgement dealing with all matters under consideration in relation to La Residentia and its residential project and put forth a verdict in favour of La Residentia. Dhruv had been the lead counsel for La-Residentia since it was erroneously labelled as part of Amrapali Group and ordered to undergo a detailed forensic audit.
La Residentia is a real estate developer with presence in Delhi NCR region and lately has been involved in construction and development of a large-scale residential apartment complex situated at Greater Noida (part of National Capital Region of Delhi) comprising of 3,256 premium residential apartments. When the project in question was launched, La Residentia was a new entrant in the industry and had sought assistance from Amrapali Group in form of branding (to market and sell the project using goodwill and reputation of Amrapali enjoyed at that time), against which La Residentia had allowed Amrapali Group to hold about 13.25% shareholding in La Residentia (which later increased to 19.75%).
The Hon’ble Supreme Court had earlier directed La Residentia to undergo detailed forensic audit, particularly to assess if there existed any nexus between Amrapali and La Residentia, basis Amrapali’s shareholding in La Residentia, which was a direct consequence of unearthing of financial frauds and scams of Amrapali Group, before the Supreme Court during the proceedings against Amrapali Group.
The final judgement dated June 29, 2021 of Hon’ble Supreme Court holds value and significance as the apex court in its verdict held, inter alia, that La Residentia is independent of Amrapali and its group companies, the project in question has achieved substantial completion unlike projects of Amrapali which were either stalled at a stage after launch or were shelved after collecting substantial funds from buyers. Most importantly, the Hon’ble Supreme Court ended the lien that was order over unsold inventory in La Residentia’s project and while most incomplete projects of Amrapali were handed over to Government run construction management agency NBCC for completion (after ousting management of Amrapali), the S Hon’ble upreme Court decided against such action in the case of La Residentia and entrusted the management of La Residentia with the responsibility of completion and handover of the project to the buyers.
This matter has gained wide coverage over print and electronic media. Below links can be accessed for more details:
