Rejig on MahaRERA website will kill all transparency: Experts

This is a pro-builder move, said Advocate Vinod Sampat, founder and president of Flat Users Residents Welfare Association

Thousands of orders by MahaRERA have been missing from the website of the housing regulator for the past few days, practising lawyers and CAs have alleged. Until recently, they said, the orders, listed project-wise, were easily accessible on the same page. MahaRERA said the portal has been made more user friendly and all the orders are available on it.

CA Ramesh Prabhu, Maharashtra Societies Welfare Association (MahaSEWA), said, "By removing the system of tagging complaints to a registered project certainly is against the following provisions of RERA - (1) to bring transparency in rulings of RERA, (2) to provide litigation against the project which will help the prospective buyers to take an informed decision on the booking of apartments by going through the complaints filed and (3) To comply with provisions of section 4 of RERA to upload the litigation against the project…"

As of date, MahaRERA has registered 17,960 complaints of which 17,079 complaints are against registered projects and 881 are against un-registered projects. A total of 12,098 orders, including 11,299 for registered projects, have been passed.

Solicitor Stuti Galiya said, "Making the judgments available online in a systematic and seamless manner epitomizes transparency, good governance and accountability…The new tab functionality on orders uploaded does not contain various filters and specific search options, which will make it difficult and time-consuming for the users to procure information regarding the project/builder and the relevant orders passed in this regard." She said the Supreme Court and high court websites provide easy access to judgments.

Advocate Godfrey Pimenta

Advocate Godfrey Pimenta, who practises in MahaRERA, said, "Earlier, the portal, for a given real estate project, provided detailed information including various orders passed by MahaRERA pertaining to the said project, including the number of flats booked, the status of project completion, number of complaints received and disposed of, including the financial soundings of the promoters, etc., which unfortunately is not seen, as the content with regards to MahaRERA orders passed pertaining to real estate project has been moved under a new sub-head ‘Ruling and judgements'."

Advocate Vinod Sampat, founder and president of Flat Users Residents Welfare Association, said, "The Housing Department is trying its level best to protect the builders… Our association will be writing to RERA Officials, at the state and Centre to ensure that there is transparency and it is more user friendly. The act of RERA officials will result in harassment of the flat purchasers and to a certain extent will make the builders a bit bolder." Sampat added, "If a builder has got 15 cases against him, it becomes difficult to track the same based on the rulings."

The other side

Vasant Prabhu, secretary MahaRERA, said, "By providing the project title or promoter details, the end-user can get the entire list of complaints received by MahaRERA, cases heard and dealt, etc. We understand that it is practically difficult for anyone to check the entire list of MahaRERA orders and zero in on a particular project or promoter. We rather expect and want the public at large to visit MahaRERA portals before investing their hard-earned money on any project without due diligence, and verify all project-wise details and the status of projects with complaints."

To get MahaRERA orders

Step1: Visit the MahaRERA website - https://maharera.mahaonline.gov.in/
Step2: Click on the REGISTRATION tab
Step 3: Select COMPLAINTS sub-tab
Step 4: Either PROJECT-WISE or PROMOTER-WISE tab can be selected as below
Step 5: If PROJECT-WISE sub-tab is clicked, a pop-up window is opened prompting you to click OK it will get redirected to the system application. Here, live data related to all the project complaints will be displayed.
Step 6: Proceed with STEP 5 as above to view PROMOTER-WISE project complaints.
(Courtesy: Vasant Prabhu, Secretary, MahaRERA)