The Maharashtra Real Estate Appellate Tribunal, Mumbai (“Appellate Tribunal”), in the matter of Xrbia Developers Ltd. v. Firoz Aziz Shaikh (“Appeal”), has, inter alia, held that the Adjudicating Officer (“AO”) under RERA is only empowered to adjudicate on the compensation to be granted under Section 71 and Section 72 of the RERA.
The Hon’ble Appellate Tribunal has further held that the jurisdiction to adjudicate on the matters relating to refund with interest under Section 18 of RERA vests with Adjudicating Authority.
The Hon’ble Appellate Tribunal, whilst deciding the issue of sustainability of the order passed by AO in the complaint preferred by the allottee seeking refund with interest along with other reliefs had held that,
“11. Considering the legal position discussed and held as above, it is crystal clear that AO has powers only to adjudge compensation under Sections 71 read with 72 of RERA and has no jurisdiction to decide matters for allowing refund with interest under Section 18 which is vested with the Authority only. Consequently, the order passed by AO with regard to subject matter involved in the above complaint is obviously without jurisdiction as per provisions of RERA. It is a fundamental principle well established that an order passed by a forum having no jurisdiction over subject matter is a nullity. An objection to lts valldity can be raised at any time including the appeal proceedings. For the said reasons, the impugned order passed by AO cannot be sustained and therefore is liable to be quashed and set aside being a nulllty for lack of jurisdiction of subject matter as contended by Promoter, We answer the point accordingly.”
