Zirakpur Builder's Tower Attached To Recover Buyer's Award ज़ीरकपुर बिल्डर का टावर खरीदार का अवार्ड वसूलने को कुर्क ਜ਼ੀਰਕਪੁਰ ਬਿਲਡਰ ਦਾ ਟਾਵਰ ਖ਼ਰੀਦਦਾਰ ਦਾ ਅਵਾਰਡ ਵਸੂਲਣ ਲਈ ਕੁਰਕ

A homebuyer in Sushma Grande NXT at Gazipur, Zirakpur, won her case against the developer in March twenty twenty five. More than a year and a half later, the award was still not fully paid. On the twenty eighth of October twenty twenty six, the state consumer court that sits in Chandigarh told the Deputy Commissioner of SAS Nagar to attach the developer's project at Tower C and appoint a receiver to recover what is owed.

The Tribune reported the order on the thirtieth of October. This piece reads the order itself, the earlier orders in the same case on the national e-Jagriti portal, and the two sections of the Consumer Protection Act, twenty nineteen, that the case runs under. The developer is named in the court's record as SBL Builder Private Limited. The buyer is not named here.

What the court ordered on the twenty eighth

The order was passed in an execution application under section seventy one of the Act. The court recorded a letter from the State Bank of India branch in Sector Seventeen, Chandigarh. The bank said there was no balance in the developer's account, though a hold had been marked on it for the amount due.

The buyer then gave the court details of the developer's project and asked for it to be attached. The court directed the Deputy Commissioner cum Collector, SAS Nagar, to attach "the entire project of the judgment debtors situated at Sushma Grande, NXT, Tower C, Zirakpur". It also directed the appointment of a receiver for recovery of the amount awarded.

The order says the recovery is to be treated as land revenue and recovered from the developer. Certified copies, along with the project details the buyer filed, go to the Deputy Commissioner. A compliance report is due on or before the next hearing, which is the ninth of December.

How the case reached this point

The order of March twenty twenty five sets out the history. The buyer signed an agreement for sale for a flat in Tower C on the ninth of July twenty twenty one. Clause seven point one promised possession by the ninth of September twenty twenty two. Possession was offered on the twenty eighth of August twenty twenty four. The offer came without the completion and occupation certificates.

The developer argued four points. The buyer was a speculator, Covid had delayed the project, a RERA registered project could not be heard by a consumer court, and the allotment had been cancelled because the buyer stopped paying. The court rejected each point. It noted that the buyer had paid almost the whole price and set the cancellation aside. Relying on Supreme Court rulings, it held that RERA does not bar a consumer complaint.

The court treated an offer without the two certificates as no real possession. It directed the developer to hand over actual physical possession with both certificates within forty five days of receiving the order, on payment of any balance due. It also ordered compensation by way of interest for the delay. A lump sum for harassment and the costs of the case were added. The court had already ordered the developer in September twenty twenty four to keep the flat as it was while the complaint was pending.

Two tracks against the same award

The buyer then used both routes the Act provides. The first was a case under section seventy two, which makes failure to comply with an order an offence. In July twenty twenty five the court decided to try that application as a complaint and issued show cause notices.

The developer's lawyers appeared and the developer made part payments in the autumn and winter of twenty twenty five. Each time a balance remained on the buyer's calculation sheet. When payments stopped, the court ordered bailable warrants and, from March twenty twenty six, non-bailable warrants against the developer's directors.

The orders record that those warrants kept coming back unexecuted. The police reported that the directors were out of station or could not be traced. The court asked the Director General of Police, Chandigarh, to depute a special team headed by a DSP. In May twenty twenty six the developer's lawyers withdrew, saying they had no instructions. On the twenty eighth of October the court issued fresh non-bailable warrants, again returnable on the ninth of December.

The second route is the execution application under section seventy one, filed in May twenty twenty six. The developer did not appear despite notice. In August the court asked the bank to hold the account and remit the amount due. When the bank reported no balance, the court turned to the project itself.

What section seventy one allows

Section seventy one of the Consumer Protection Act says every order of a consumer court "shall be enforced by it in the same manner as if it were a decree made by a Court in a suit before it". It applies the execution rules in Order twenty one of the Code of Civil Procedure "as far as may be".

That is why the court can enforce its award like a civil court decree. Attachment of property and a receiver are part of that toolkit. Section seventy two runs alongside it. It makes non-compliance punishable with imprisonment or a fine, and the two can be combined. It also gives the consumer court the powers of a magistrate to try the offence.

What it means for other Tower C buyers

The order attaches the developer's project at Tower C. It does not list flats or say which units remain the developer's. It also says nothing about flats already sold to other buyers, or registered in their names.

Those questions belong to the attachment itself, which the Deputy Commissioner now has to carry out and report on. The order does not cancel any other allotment or decide any other buyer's claim. Each of those would turn on the steps the Deputy Commissioner and the receiver take, and on any objection filed when they do.

For a buyer elsewhere in Tower C, the case is still worth reading for the March twenty twenty five reasoning. The court held that a possession offer without the completion and occupation certificates was no real possession, and that a buyer who held back the last payment during a long delay could not lose the allotment for it. Those findings bind only this case. They show how this court reads the same project's papers.

What is still open

The developer can still pay. An order under section seventy two can be appealed, and the developer has not appeared in the execution application since May. The Deputy Commissioner's report due on the ninth of December is the next record of whether any part of Tower C has been attached and whether a receiver is in place.

This piece rests on the orders in one buyer's case. Those orders settle nothing for the project as a whole, and the outcome of the attachment is not yet known.

Related reading

- Offer of possession without occupancy and completion certificates: what counts
- A Zirakpur commercial unit buyer still counted as a consumer: what the Mohali forum held
- A Zirakpur flat allotment cancelled after the possession date passed: what Punjab RERA held
- A Mohali contractor took an advance and never started: what the consumer forum ordered

Sources: The sources we use are listed on our Editorial Sources page.

This piece describes orders in one consumer case and the sections of the Consumer Protection Act they rely on. Nothing here is legal advice, and the position of any other Tower C buyer turns on that buyer's own papers and on the attachment proceedings.