Janjivan Bureau / New Delhi : Embattled real estate major Amrapali was o in for more trouble n Wednesday as the Supreme Court ordered sealing of seven of the group companies’ premises in Noida and Greater Noida, and two premises in Rajgir and Buxar in Bihar.
The order came from a Bench headed by Justice UU Lalit after the three directors—taken into police custody on Tuesday—tell top court that all relevant documents needed for forensic audit of 46 group companies are kept there.
After the sealing, keys have to be handed over to the Supreme Court Registry to ebnsure that the documents were accessed only by the forensic auditors.
The court also took an undertaking from the company’ promoters/directors Anil Sharma, Shiv Priya and Ajay Kumar that all relevant documents were at the said premises and warned that if it was found to be wrong they would be taken to task.
Amrapali directors wanted the court release them from police custody, claiming all account papers are at the said seven premises.
The seven premises in question have now been ordered to be sealed by the court.
The top court made it clear that they were to remain in police custody until all relevant documents were handed over to the forensic auditors.
Having allegedly duped thousands of homebuyers, the Amrapali Group promoters/directors had landed in trouble with the top court on Tuesday sending three of them to police custody for playing “hide and seek” with it and avoid handing over relevant documents needed for forensic audit of 46 of the group’s companies.
A Bench of Justice Arun Mishra and Justice UU Lalit had ordered them to be taken into custody during the proceedings and directed that they be taken to their offices, residences and other places where they must hand over all relevant documents to forensic auditors.
“You are playing hide and seek. You are trying to mislead the court,” said the Bench noting the directors’ conduct was in “gross violation” of its order.
It had directed DCP, New Delhi, SSP Noida and SSP Greater Noida to do the needful and posted the matter for further hearing on October 24.
The Bench—which was visibly angry over the the Amrapali directors’ conduct in not handing over all the documents to forensic auditors, directed its directors– Anil Kumar Sharma, Shiv Priya and Ajay Kumar—shall remain in police custody till they handed over all the documents.
It directed the forensic auditors to provide year-wise and company-wise list to the police,
The Bench also gave liberty to the Delhi Police to investigate criminal cases against the company. “Nothing comes in the way of Delhi Police, Economic Offences Wing to make any criminal investigation in any case which is required to be made. Let the investigations be made,” it said.
Noting that EOW was free to file a chargesheet in the matter, the Bench asked Delhi Police to apprise it in three months about the steps taken.
The top court had earlier ordered Amrapali group statutory and internal auditors to audit the accounts of all the companies of the Amrapali Group to find out how Rs 2,765 crore was diverted by its directors. It had directed the company to hand over all the relevant documents to the two auditors who told the Bench that no documents had been shared with them by Amrapali Group since 2015.
The Bench – which has already ordered freezing of accounts of Amrapali Group companies and their directors for playing “dirty games” with the court and “defrauding” homebuyers – is seized of homebuyers’ petitions seeking possession of around 42,000 flats. The court had also sought details of all the bank accounts of 40 companies of the group and their directors.
The top court had on Tuesday directed Delhi police to seize all the documents of the Amrapali group and hand them over to forensic auditors. Not a single document should remain in custody of the group, it said.
The top court had earlier allowed the National Buildings Construction Corporation Ltd (NBCC) to float tenders for selecting the builder to complete the stalled projects of Amrapali Group and asked it to prepare a detailed project report for pending projects within 60 days.
On September 12, the apex court had appointed NBCC to develop stalled projects of the realty firm and directed the Debts Recovery Tribunal to sell the unencumbered commercial properties of the group.
The NBCC had earlier given a proposal for completion of 15 residential projects of Amrapali having 46,575 flats at an estimated cost of Rs 8,500 crore in six to 36 months.
The court had directed the opening of an escrow account in the apex court in which the amount received after the sale of properties would be deposited and later disbursed to the NBCC to start construction of the pending projects in Group A and B Categories.
