The Supreme Court yesterday reached a decision that the retrospective Value Added Tax that has been imposed on builders for properties sold from 2006 onwards is valid, and that it should be paid by the builder to the Sales Tax department by October 31, 2012. Unfortunately, neither the Supreme Court, nor the Sales Tax department spoke on behalf of the consumers. Of course, the builders were never expected to.

More than 2,000 builders in Mumbai were either raided or sent notices by the Sales Tax department recently following a discovery that they collected VAT from their home buyers but never deposited that money with the government. Now, to collect that money, builders in turn are sending notices to those who have bought flats in the last five years to recover the money.