PUDUCHERRY: The rise in cost of living has made owning an independent house a distant dream, especially for the common man. Nowadays many people are choosing to buy apartments and in this regard most are dependent on builders for purchase of their dream homes. However, those travelling down this road should watch out for malpractice in sales as they could end up purchasing a flat already sold out to another party. An incident in this regard took place at Sea View apartments in Solainagar. Harshad Patel purchased a flat in October 2010 from the builder G Purushottanam. Subsequently the same flat was sold out to Shiva in December 2010 by the builder. The flat was priced at Rs 45 lakh. However, when the flat was complete, Harshad Patel sold it to Richa Berolia on August 26, 2011. A resident of Kuruchikuppam, she left her rented house and came to occupy the flat on September 3 only to find Shiva living there.After discovering that he had been cheated, Shiva forcibly occupied the flat.With no other recourse, Richa filed a complaint with the Muthialpet police station on October 1. Station House Officer Sajith said that after enquiries, Purushottanam was arrested on Tuesday and remanded to judicial custody.The builder confessed that he was short of money and needed funds to complete the flats and obtained the money through the duel sale. The modus operandi is facilitated by the fact that the purchasers of flats will never be aware of its sale to the other party till they come for occupation. The builder executes the sale in phases. First an agreement is signed for sale of the flat with the party which helps in getting a bank loan. Then a registration is done for the undivided share of the land on which multiple flats are erected. This registration document does not have the flat number and only contains details of the extent of the land. Only the agreement document contains the flat number. This gives scope for multiple sale of a flat as there would be no scope for the purchaser to know about any previous sale of the flat.Registration authorities say that this lacuna in the system is being addressed by government and a new system being made ready would come into effect in the next three to four years.
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