Mumbai: For 156 families, a 25-year-long wait for their own flat will be over this year. They tried their luck in the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority’s (MHADA) housing lottery draw in 2000, and will get possession of their homes in Thane’s Chitalsar Manpada area in 2025, as the project has finally received the Occupation Certificate from the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC).
Over the next few weeks, MHADA’s Konkan Board will issue provisional offer letters to the 156 winners to initiate completion of pending formalities, including payment of the balance amount, allotment letters and possession of homes, an official said.
These winners are from the Economically Weaker Section and Low Income Group categories, who had tried their luck in 2000. MHADA had listed an under-construction project in Chitalsar Manpada for sale through its routine lottery draw process.
The families paid ₹10,000 towards the deposit, a prerequisite for an applicant to be eligible for the housing lottery draw. When MHADA initiated the process to secure the building’s construction permission, TMC objected, stating that the project cannot proceed because the plot has a reservation on it, thereby stalling the proposed construction.
During these years, MHADA did not refund the earnest money deposit to the winners. Each tenement had a price tag of around ₹51 lakh then. However, in a major relief for the winners, MHADA decided to reduce the flat’s price earlier this year.
“MHADA reduced the price of these homes by about ₹15 lakh. Therefore, people will get these homes for approximately ₹36.51 lakh,” the official said.
Last year, MHADA offered 869 homes at Chiltalsar Manpada for sale through the lottery draw.
In the ongoing housing lottery to sell 2,640 units across Mumbai, the MHADA Board has included 1,762 under-construction houses for sale. The deadline has been revised from April 29 to May 14. Until Sunday afternoon, 43,637 applications with earnest money deposit were received from the total 65,082 applications (with and without the mandatory deposit).
