In another blow to realty major Unitech Ltd, Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the company to deposit Rs 15 crore for an unfinished project in Gurugram. While issuing the order, the apex court asked Unitech to pay Rs 5 crore within 2 weeks and the rest Rs 10 crore has to be paid by September end.
Unitech was asked to deposit the amount to refund the principal amount to the investors who had bought flats in the area but did not get possession in time.
The shares of the real estate company slumped 20 per cent intraday on Tuesday after its lawyers told Supreme Court that it doesn’t have funds to refund the money to home buyers. Bombay Stock Exchange had sought a clarification from the company on the media reports. “We don’t have money. If we had money, we would have constructed the flats and buildings and given to them,” senior advocated A M Singhvi, the counsel for Unitech Ltd, told a bench of Justices Dipak Misra and U U Lalit said.
The company in a clarification issued on Tuesday evening said its counsel’s statement in the Supreme Court has been misquoted. “His (counsel’s) contention was that the money received from customers has already been invested in land cost and building structures constructed at the project site, and therefore its is not feasible to deposit the money. In fact, in the large interest, deposit money can be better utilised for construction and completion of the pending project,” the company’s statement said. As a result, the company’s shares were trading 2.54 per cent up at Rs 5.24 on Wednesday at 12.55 pm.
The apex court last Friday had asked Unitech lawyers to submit a list of buyers who wanted the deposit by the August 17 hearing.