Mumbai: A luxury flat that offers the views of the famous Mahalaxmi Race Course on one side and the Arabian Sea on the other side was put up for sale in the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA) lottery in 2023. The property in South Mumbai’s Crescent Tower, however, did not find any takers.
But the MHADA did not lose hope. Again in 2024, the flat nestled in Mumbai’s heart at Tardeo was put up for lottery. The results were the same. So in 2025, the MHADA decided to delink the unit from the Crescent Tower and to put up an advertisement promising to sell this apartment and others on a first-come, first-served basis.
“After two unsuccessful lotteries, we decided that there is no point waiting. So we decided to delink the apartments. Now in the next two weeks, by mid-November, we will put up the property for sale,” an official from MHADA told ThePrint.
The MHADA lottery is a scheme by the statutory body—established by the Maharashtra government—providing affordable housing through a computerised, random lottery process that enables eligible Maharashtra residents to own a house.
There are various income groups that this scheme caters to: economically weaker section (EWS) for those with a family income of up to Rs 6 lakh per annum; lower income group (LIG) for those with a family income between Rs 6 lakh and Rs 9 lakh; middle income group (MIG) for those with a family income between Rs 9 lakh to Rs 12 lakh; and high income group (HIG) for those with a Rs 12 lakh-plus family income.
The HIG flats in question were in the range of Rs 1 crore and Rs 6 crore plus. In 2024, the Crescent Tower apartment on the 19th floor that went unsold was priced at Rs 6.82 crore.
Even MLA withdrew lot
Built by Shapoorji Pallonji, Crescent Tower with 21 floors boasts of various amenities including a swimming pool, gymnasium, a landscaped garden within the complex along with laundry facility. There is also a rainwater harvesting facility in the complex. Special attention is given to the security aspect. It is a gated community with an intercom facility.
The flats of the Cresecent Tower entered the MHADA’s list of properties over a decade ago when builders were allowed to redevelop old properties and retain a part of the built up area and make profits off the extra Floor Space Index (FSI) instead of charging a premium cost for the land.
Though this policy was later scrapped, the MHADA retained the flats, which were earlier handed out by builders and in 2023 made available through the MHADA’s lottery. Seven apartments in the building fell into the MHADA’s kitty, according to the above-mentioned MHADA official.
In 2023, the priciest of the seven flats at the Crescent Tower was a 1,531 sq ft 3 BHK property on the 19th floor valued at Rs 7.58 crore. The remaining six flats measured between 1,520 sq ft and 1,530 sq ft, with the smallest valued at Rs 5.93 crore.
That year, BJP legislator Narayan Kuche was allotted the 3BHK flat under a separate reservation for sitting and former MLAs, MLCs. The Badnapur MLA, however, surrendered the HIG flat citing financial reasons.
The MHADA sets aside a certain number of homes—that are up for sale—for sitting and former elected representatives, as well as for other categories including Scheduled Class (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST), freedom fighters, specially abled, artists, and journalists.
With no further takers, the flats went back into the lottery pool in 2024 and again it did not find any takers as people backed out, the official said. Due to this, the MHADA decided in a meeting in September to delink these properties and sell those apartments on a first-come, first-served basis.
“People applying and backing out is not unheard of. Such things do happen. However, we could not have kept the flats unsold if there were no buyers from the lottery,” the official explained.
The prices of the Crescent Tower’s units are below the market prices, but they were still the costliest flats in the MHADA’s history. “We will re-evaluate the price of the flats at ready reckoner rates when we put up the advertisement again in mid-November,” the MHADA official said.
(Edited by Tony Rai)