New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday said all owners of flats built at Maradu in the port city of Kochi in violation of coastal zone regulation guidelines and have been ordered to be pulled down will get Rs 25 lakh each.
A bench of Justices Arun Mishra and S. Ravindra Bhat ordered the payment of Rs 25 lakh to each of the 322 flat owners after the bench was told the three-member committee headed by a retired Kerala high court judge ordered payment of around Rs 14 lakhs each based on the value indicated on the stamp paper of the sale deed.
Noting the market escalation of the price of the flats compared to when the sale deeds were entered into, the bench said each of the flat owners who would lose their dwellings would be paid Rs 25 lakh each.
The Supreme Court by its September 27 order had directed the Kerala government to pay Rs 25 lakh as interim compensation to each of the flat owners of Maradu whose dwellings were ordered demolished for breach of the Coastal Regulation Zone guidelines. The three-member committee, however, made the payment on the basis of the amount on the stamp paper of the sale deed.
Besides this, the court ordered all builders together should deposit Rs 20 crores, that would go towards the payment of Rs 25 lakhs compensation to each of the flat owners. The amount that each of the builders would have to pay will be fixed by the three-member committee.
The attached properties of builders would be released in proportion to the amount each would be paying in compliance of the order to deposit Rs 20 crores.
Having ordered the builders to pay Rs 20 crores, the court asked each of them to state on affidavit their assets and bank accounts. The Supreme Court, at the last hearing of the matter on September 27, had said the compensation paid to the affected flat owners from funds allocated by the Kerala government would be recovered from the builders.
The Supreme Court by its May 8 order directed the demolition of the flats as they were built in breach of the Coastal Regulation Zone guidelines, and did not have proper approvals. The court, by its September 6 order, set a deadline of September 20 for demolition of the unauthorisedly constructed flats. The next hearing of the matter is on November 22.
