Latest Mhada lottery winners may get exemption from GST

Mumbai: If you are a Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (Mhada) lottery winner and the building in which the flat allocated to you is located has an OC (occupancy certificate), you may count yourself lucky! Reason being you may not be required to cough up extra bucks to pay Goods and Services Tax (GST) as the overhead would have been taken care of by the concerned builder.

Subhash Lakhe, chief officer, Mumbai board, Mhada, said, “As per the legal opinion given by our CA panel, if the sale price (amount paid for a flat) is realised after the OC is obtained, only in that case probably GST may not be applicable.”

Last week, the housing authority announced a lottery for 819 houses in Mumbai scheduled for November 10. Following the announcement, Mhada drew a lot of flak from activists and housing experts with houses for the higher income group (HIG) crossing the Rs 1 crore mark. Of the 819 flats, eight flats are for the economically weaker section, 192 are for low-income groups, 218 for medium-income groups, and 338 for HIG families.  

In August, a special panel was formed by the housing authority to check if the 12 per cent GST on sale properties would be applicable to lottery flats as well. However, the panel was of the opinion that GST would not be applicable for Mhada homes.

Going by an official advertisement released by the authority, 15 out of the 31 schemes have received an OC so far.