UT never kept vow,left us in lurch: Parsvnath

In its detailed reply running into 125 pages submitted last week,Parsvnath has alleged that Administration “deliberately and mischievously” has concealed material facts from the District Court. Taking Parsvnath’s reply on record,the District Court has summoned the entire original record from the Arbitration Tribunal to decide the dispute.

Stating that “it does not behove the Administration to blame the company for its own lapses”,Parsvnath has submitted that the builder has “suffered tremendous financial losses on account of such breaches by the Administration”. The voluminous reply further states that the company never imagined that the Administration will adopt such a “callous attitude towards the project”.

The reply further states that the Administration had “no jurisdiction to terminate the contract”. The reply further reads,“UT Administration was bound to fulfill its contractual obligations without the applicant having to reciprocate. Having admitted in clear and categorical terms that various lapses were attributable to them,it does not lie in their mouth to aver anything to the contrary at this highly belated stage. Not even a shred of evidence was placed on record to show that despite directions to do so,the company had failed to extend the Bank guarantee of Rs 5 crore. Parsvnath was in no way responsible for any breach”.

Taking a dig at the Administration,the company has stated,“The meaning of any contract must be gathered by adopting a common sense approach and it should not be allowed to be thwarted by a narrow,pedantic and legalistic interpretation. The endeavour of the applicant is to give a very narrow interpretation to the provisions of the contract,which is not permissible as per law. No party can be made to wait endlessly without any solution in sight. Promises made from time to time in this regard went unfulfilled,leaving the company in the lurch.”

The company has further added that objections taken by the Administration to the order of the Arbitration Tribunal are based on “hypothetical assumptions which have no value in the eyes of law”. Reacting to the remarks made by Administration regarding the members (all retired Judges of High and Supreme Court) of the Tribunal,the company has stated that “it is unfortunate that the Administration has made such allegations against the Tribunal which comprised of legal luminaries. Such practice deserves to be severely deprecated”.

Further adding that the grounds of objection taken by the Administration are “devoid of merit”,the company has stated that the “defaults” (made by the company) as alleged by the Administration are “mere figment of imagination on the part of the Administration and have no rational nexus with the material on record”.

In a 50-page order,the Tribunal,in March had held the Administration squarely responsible for not approving zoning plan for the Filmcity project.

The dispute relates to the Filmcity project,which was to come up in an area of 30 acres in Sarangpur village. The project was awarded in 2007. The Rs 191-crore project was allotted to Parsvnath but later scrapped. The Administration had terminated the contract and forfeited the Rs 47.75-crore deposit paid by the company on December 16,2009.