Kabul Chawla is the focus of an investigation by The New York Times.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: In 2008, about 200 decorated military officers put down deposits on apartments at Park Serene, a high-rise facility in Gurgaon, Haryana, developed by the New Delhi-based Kabul Chawla, owner of the real estate company company BPTP.
Apart from special military discounts and the plethora of amenities offered at the apartment complex, the officers were looking forward to enjoying their retirement in the company of their most trusted comrades in arms.
Fast forward six years later, in September, 2014, the same officers were united in demonstrating in a march in New Delhi, against Chawla. They alleged that BPTP robbed each of them blind.
According to a new investigation by The New York Times, BPTP collected almost 100 percent of the price attached to the Park Serene apartments from 400 different buyers. The total outlay is estimated by the protestors to exceed $35 million — now all in the hands of Chawla.
While complaints and accusations are steadily mounting against Chawla, who has developed two dozen other major residential complexes around Delhi, many of the former military officers who invested in Park Serene are sinking in their effort to find somewhere else to live.
As one might imagine, homelessness is not a plight affecting Chawla in the slightest — least of when he’s the owner of a 4,050-square-foot condominium housed in the Time Warner Center, in Manhattan, featuring five bedrooms, a media room, lofty ceilings, and an unencumbered, aerial view of Central Park.
Chawla denies owning the $19.4 million home, instead insisting that it belongs to his cousin, but The New York Times uncovered correspondence between real estate brokers and other sources corroborating Chawla as the apartment’s owner. Currently, the ownership of the unit is shrouded in a veil of secrecy provided by a Delaware shell company with a Singaporean address that admittedly evokes the ambitions of an international property mogul: “NYC Real Estate Opportunities.”
Chawla, who is in his early 40s, entered real estate more than 20 years ago when he constructed a building on property owned by his father. While his family’s name is venerated in India due to the heroism of his cousin– astronaut Kalpana Chawla, who perished aboard the space shuttle Columbia — Kabul Chawla has opted to play the villain during his time in the spotlight.
Aside from the steady influx of grievances stemming from his residential properties, 2011 saw a highly publicized case brought against the real estate magnate in which an accountant accused him of stealing 40 lakh rupees, which was then the equivalent of $85,000. The accountant, Suresh Goel, claims BPTP sold him a commercial lot — where he planned to open an office — before acquiring the proper licenses. When Goel brought it up to the company, it cancelled his contract without returning his money.
Dozens of similar case have cropped up against Chawla and the BPTP, but the company continues to operate freely.
Manoj Pandey, a real estate agent who told the New York Times he sold more than 100 BPTP plots, even described a malicious pattern where the company’s explicit goal was to sell property, reassign the customers to less desirable locations, and then resell the original property for even more revenue.
“They promised heaven to all the buyers,” recounted Pandey to the Times.