The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) is reviewing applications of the recent drawing for its housing program after allegations of inconsistencies were made public.
According to the DDA, the allotment of flats will not be delayed and the camp for successful applicants will be held on schedule. If inconsistencies or discrepancies are found in the application, the flat will go to one of the 1,000 candidates on the waiting list.
During the preliminary examination, discrepancies were apparent in a number of the applications. These included:
- Both the applicant’s names and their father’s names being the same but addresses, numbers and PAN numbers being different.
- Applications having consecutive numbers even when there is a difference in addresses and application numbers.
- War widows who have female names but list their gender as male, and vice-versa.
The applications will be reviewed by the DDA, who said in a statement, “On the direction of Vice-Chairman, Delhi Development Authority (DDA), Balvinder Kumar, all original applications of all the applicants have been called from the banks and these will be scrutinized to find out whether there are mistakes in the punching of data or there are inadvertent mistakes done by the applicant himself or herself.”
“The results of the draw are provisional as no documents were asked at the time of submission of application and the claims of applicants for reservation under various categories or otherwise were accepted as such,” the statement continued.”
The DDA’s scheme involved the drawing of lots for flats in late November, similar to the new projects in Jaipur. There were over 1 million applicants vying for only 25,034 flats. Unsuccessful applicants will have their security deposit s refunded to them with a month of the draw, but Babul Supriyo, Minister of the State for Urban Development and Housing, told the Lok Sabha, India’s lower house of Parliament, that guidelines do allow for up to 90 days to refund the deposit. Any deposit that requires more than 30 days to refund will draw simple interest of 8 percent until it is paid back to the applicant.
This housing scheme had the largest number of applicants in DDA history and was held on November 25.
