ASPIRE to hand over close to 7,000 housing units to Amrapali homebuyers by Diwali: Sources

NBCC is the project management consultant for the Amrapali projects and is responsible for the quality and timely completion of work (Representative picture)

Amrapali Stalled Projects Investments Reconstruction Establishment (ASPIRE), tasked to complete the construction of almost 40,000 stuck housing units by the erstwhile Amrapali Group, will be handing over 300 units to homebuyers starting July 16. This will take the number of units completed to around 3,000 till date, sources said.

ASPIRE consists of the court receiver, a forensic auditor and a chartered accountant. It is a not-for-profit company under Section 8 of Companies Act, 2013.

The company is expected to be ready with another 7,000 housing units by Diwali and around 3,000 more by the end of the financial year, sources told Moneycontrol, adding that as per the plan the remaining units will be completed by end of 2024.

The government’s construction arm NBCC (India) Limited, appointed as construction partner and consultant to complete the stuck housing units, has till date completed around 3,000 units and would be delivering 384 units in the projects — Silicon City II and Dream Valley Villas — starting this weekend, they said.

As much as Rs 2,700 crore has already been spent on the construction of the stuck housing units and another Rs 1,200 crore is expected to be spent by March 2023, they said.

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The court receiver advocate R Venkataramani appointed by the Supreme Court to supervise construction work being undertaken by NBCC, will be handing over the possession letters to homebuyers on July 16, they said, adding the registration process will also start soon.

Sources also told Moneycontrol that the court-appointed committee and the company ASPIRE wish to extend a helping hand to deserving homebuyers for which it has appealed to philanthropic individuals, companies and establishments to contribute to the corpus of ASPIRE which has relevant income tax exemptions.

They said that a representation by families of 30 to 40 homebuyers — children whose parents passed away during COVID-19 or from people who have lost their jobs — has been received and efforts will be made to help them pay up the pending amount through CSR funding, they said.

Amrapali Group's ex-directors Anil Kumar Sharma, Shiv Priya, and Ajay Kumar are behind bars on the top court's order since 2019 and multiple cases have been lodged against them for allegedly diverting homebuyers’ money.

The court had, in 2019, asked the government’s construction arm to complete and deliver 38,159 flats by the erstwhile Amrapali Group after several homebuyers sought its intervention, complaining about years of delay in handing over their homes.

The SC on October 13, 2020 had permitted the court receiver to incorporate a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to enable flow of funds from SBICap for completion of unfinished projects. SBICap has agreed to fund Rs 650 crore for around 7,000 stuck units. It is for this reason that the company Amrapali Stalled Projects Investments Reconstruction Establishment (ASPIRE) was floated.

ASPIRE announced the sale of the units through an open draw in March 2021.

On July 23, 2019, the top court cancelled the registration of the Amrapali Group under the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016, and ousted it from its prime properties in NCR by nixing land leases for breaching buyers’ trust.