AHMEDABAD: The Gujarat high court has lifted the stay on an order by the Gujarat Real Estate Regulatory Authority (GujRERA) to detain office bearers of Pacifica Developers Pvt Ltd, including its managing director Rakesh Israni, in a 60-day civil prison. The developers were penalised for failing to hand over possession of a house to a customer and allegedly selling the same property to a third party.
In addition to clearing the way for execution of the civil prison order, Justice Vaibhavi Nanavati last week referred the case to a division bench for the initiation of contempt of court proceedings against Israni, the company, and other office bearers—Darpan Tarwani, Kaushik Patel, and Jay Chandani—for making false statements before the court.
“The conduct of the original petitioners in SCA No. 20527 of 2022 is contemptuous and requires action. This court deems it fit to refer the original petitioners to the bench handling contempt matters,” the order reads.
In 2019, GujRERA had ordered Pacifica Developers to hand over possession of a flat to the complainant, Rachna Sharma. When they failed to comply, GujRERA, in October 2022, directed that Israni and others be sent to civil prison for 60 days.
The developers approached the high court after couple days, offering a settlement and depositing Rs 24 lakh, as ordered by the court, to be paid to Sharma. The court accepted the proposal and stayed the GujRERA order of civil detention.
Later, Sharma’s advocate, Vishal Dave, informed the court that the developers had approached the high court again and sought to withdraw their petition, stating they would instead file an appeal before the RERA appellate tribunal. The court allowed this and continued the stay on the civil detention order.
However, in 2024, Sharma approached the court again, stating that the developers had never filed an appeal before the appellate tribunal and had continued to enjoy the stay order wrongfully.
Justice Nanavati observed, “The aforesaid in the opinion of this court, is nothing but abuse of process of law and the said act is contemptuous in nature and in the opinion of this court, the original petitioners (builders) are jointly and severally liable for the same.”
While referring the matter to a division bench for contempt proceedings, the high court also ordered the release of the Rs 24 lakh deposit to Sharma.
