Facilitate amendment of homebuyers CIBIL ratings: HC
The Delhi High Court has directed the lender banks and financial institutions of certain homebuyers, who have invested in projects by defaulter developers, to provide appropriate information to Credit Information Bureau (India) Limited (CIBIL) to facilitate the suitable amendment of their ratings.
Justice Rekha Palli, who was hearing a batch of petitions by several buyers/owners’ associations as well as individual homebuyers, also extended the interim order restraining banks and financial institutions from taking any coercive steps against the petitioners.
In the light of the interim order dated January 31, 2022, the respective banks/financial institutions are directed to provide appropriate information regarding the petitioners to Credit Information Bureau (India) Limited (CIBIL) in accordance with the interim order dated January 31, 2022, so that the ratings of the petitioners are suitably amended, the court ordered on March 28.
The court clarified that its interim orders will bind the lender banks before it as well as the assignees of the debt.
In the present batch of cases, the petitioners had booked flats with certain developers by availing loans under the subvention scheme and entering into a tripartite agreement with the developers and the bank/Housing Finance Companies (HFCs).
Under the scheme, the banks/HFCs was supposed to disburse the sanctioned amount directly to the accounts of the developers who were to then pay EMIs on the sanctioned loan amount until such a time that the possession of the booked residential units would be handed over to the home buyers.
It was the petitioners’ grievance that when the developers started defaulting in making the payments towards the EMIs to the banks/HFCs, the action was initiated by most banks and HFCs against them.
The petitioners had thus sought a direction to the banks not to charge the EMIs from them and other homebuyers till possession is delivered to them by the developers.
While granting interim relief to the petitioner, the court had said on January 31 that these cases brought into light the well-known sorry state of affairs which has been recently going on in the construction industry .
The court had opined that the petitioners appeared to have been left in the lurch as even after investing their hard-earned money, the construction of the residential flats/apartments have not been completed till date and they have not been granted possession of the residential units as promised by the developers who have apparently already received the loan amounts from the bank/HFCs.
I am, therefore, of the view that, the petitioners who have invested their lifetime savings and their hard-earned income to purchase residential units, cannot be made to suffer the consequences of this apparent collusion between the banks/HFCs and the developers, the judge had said.
The court had added that prima facie the loan amounts appeared to have been disbursed without any consideration for the stages of construction and without any regard to the guidelines of the Reserve Bank of India.
