When a homebuyer files a complaint before the Maharashtra Real Estate Regulatory Authority, the RERA Act mandates resolution within 60 days. The data tells a starkly different story. Across 33,805 cases recorded at MahaRERA, 80.8% remain pending — and for cases that were resolved, the average disposition time ran to 482 days, more than eight times the statutory deadline. But not every bench performs the same way. Case-level analytics sourced from JusticeML reveal wide performance gaps across the eight adjudicators who have presided over MahaRERA's dispute resolution division since 2017.
This analysis profiles all eight judges on five metrics: total caseload, case disposal rate, average resolution time, complainant win rate, and settlement rate. It also examines each judge's dominant case types, the lawyers who appear most frequently before them, and the developers who face them most often.
MahaRERA at a Glance
The RERA Act, enacted in 2016, envisioned a fast-track tribunal for real estate disputes. Section 31 allows homebuyers to file complaints against developers for delayed possession, defective construction, or non-compliance with registration conditions. Under Section 29(2), the authority is expected to dispose of each complaint within 60 days.
In practice, the court has handled 33,805 cases across eight adjudicating officers since 2017. Of those, only 19.2% have been fully disposed of. The average for resolved cases runs to 482 days — and that figure rises further when looking at the slowest individual bench, which averaged over 1,000 days. The RERA framework's promise of speedy redress has met the hard reality of India's institutional capacity constraints.
Against this backdrop, the performance of individual adjudicators matters enormously. A homebuyer assigned to one bench may wait twice as long — and may face materially different odds of winning — compared to a homebuyer assigned to another bench hearing identical facts.
How We Ranked Them
Three primary metrics form the ranking: disposal rate (proportion of assigned cases resolved), average resolution time for disposed cases (excluding same-day filings), and complainant win rate (proportion of contested decisions favouring the homebuyer, excluding settled matters). These were computed from case-level records. Data was sourced from JusticeML's legal analytics platform, which aggregates court records from MahaRERA's public case database. MahaRERA has had exactly eight adjudicating officers in the dataset — this article profiles the top five performers and the bottom three.
At a Glance: All 8 Adjudicators
| Adjudicator | Total Cases | Disposal Rate | Avg Days | Complainant Win % | Settlement Rate | Active Period |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vijay Satbir Singh | 2,696 | 62.6% | 720 | 60.7% | 25.7% | 2017–2023 |
| Mahesh Pathak | 2,454 | 56.2% | 391 | 68.7% | 31.4% | 2001–2026 |
| Gautam Chatterjee | 2,151 | 66.0% | 1,055 | 62.1% | 29.6% | 2017–2024 |
| Ajoy Mehta | 1,684 | 48.3% | 703 | 51.5% | 31.6% | 2017–2024 |
| B.D. Kapadnis | 748 | 62.4% | 427 | 77.7% | 24.6% | 2017–2021 |
| Manoj Saunik | 633 | 55.5% | 680 | 53.7% | 6.2% | 2020–2025 |
| Vasant Prabhu | 381 | 76.4% | 859 | 57.5% | 33.9% | 2017–2022 |
| Ravindra Deshpande | 97 | 36.1% | 344 | 57.4% | — | 2013–2025 |
Avg Days excludes same-day filings. Complainant Win % excludes settled matters.
The Top 5 Performers
#1 — Mahesh Pathak
Mahesh Pathak leads the MahaRERA adjudicator performance ranking on the strength of speed. His average resolution time of 391 days is the lowest among high-volume benches — less than half the 1,055-day average recorded by Gautam Chatterjee. Over his 2,454-case tenure, he has maintained a complainant win rate of 68.7%, the second-highest of any adjudicator and a significant premium over the bottom-ranked bench's 51.5%.
Case type breakdown: Of Pathak's 2,454 cases, 1,972 are standard Complaints and 280 are Online Complaints — together accounting for 91% of his docket. He has also handled a substantial volume of Review Applications (105 filed, only 39% disposed), suggesting he adjudicated on the correctness of earlier orders passed by sister benches.
Lawyers before his bench:
| Lawyer | Cases | Wins | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Leena Kaulgekar | 107 | 102 | 95.3% |
| Godfrey Pimenta | 79 | 78 | 98.7% |
| Namrata Powalkar | 44 | 30 | 68.2% |
| Charusheela Gorad | 40 | 40 | 100.0% |
| Parth Chande | 36 | 18 | 50.0% |
Leena Kaulgekar with 107 appearances and 95.3% wins is the most dominant lawyer-judge pairing in the entire dataset. Godfrey Pimenta's 98.7% win rate before Pathak contrasts sharply with his 44.4% rate before Ajoy Mehta, illustrating how bench-specific dynamics shape outcomes.
Top respondents: Supreme Construction and Developers appears in a combined 167 cases before Pathak — the largest single developer-judge pairing in the dataset, with homebuyers winning 165 of those 167 decisions. Sai Pushp Enterprises features in 43 cases, all of which resolved through settlement. Kalpataru Constructions Pune (42 cases) and Ravinanda Landmarks (37 cases) both saw complainants prevail in every single matter.
#2 — B.D. Kapadnis
B.D. Kapadnis holds the highest complainant win rate of any MahaRERA adjudicator at 77.7%. On a 748-case docket active between 2017 and 2021, he disposed of 62.4% of matters at an average of 427 days — the second-fastest rate among all benches.
Case type breakdown: Of his 748 cases, 695 are standard Complaints (60.9% disposed). He also cleared 14 Section 18 RERA applications, 11 Recovery Applications, and 11 Real Estate matters — all at 100% disposal rates, indicating he fully cleared every ancillary matter type during his tenure.
Lawyers before his bench:
| Lawyer | Cases | Wins | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Godfrey W. Pimenta | 35 | 34 | 97.1% |
| Adv. Vivek Singh | 30 | 30 | 100.0% |
| Adv. Lakshmi Murali | 16 | 15 | 93.8% |
| Rupali Shinde | 8 | 8 | 100.0% |
Top respondents: JVPD Properties Private Limited, the most frequent respondent with 78 cases, lost every single one — a 100% complainant win rate on large volume. Nirmal Lifestyle Kalyan lost 23 of 26 combined cases. The pattern is consistent: developers rarely prevailed before Kapadnis regardless of who appeared on the other side.
#3 — Vijay Satbir Singh
Vijay Satbir Singh presided over the largest docket of any MahaRERA adjudicator with 2,696 cases, making him the high-volume anchor of the court through his active period from 2017 to 2023. He disposed of 62.6% of matters at an average of 720 days. His complainant win rate of 60.7% is mid-table but respectable across such a large volume.
Singh's docket is the most structurally diverse of any adjudicator. He handled 2,207 standard Complaints (57.5% disposed) alongside approximately 232 Non-Execution Applications (~93% disposed), 104 Execution Applications (~91% disposed), and 33 Non-Compliance Complaints (97% disposed). This breadth indicates Singh served as the de facto enforcement bench in addition to adjudicating first-instance complaints.
Lawyers before his bench:
| Lawyer | Cases | Wins | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mr. Nicky Milani | 59 | 55 | 93.2% |
| Adv. Nilesh Borate | 49 | 47 | 95.9% |
| Mr. Ramesh Prabhu | 40 | 39 | 97.5% |
| Sanjay Chaturvedi | 39 | 38 | 97.4% |
Top respondents: Nirmal Lifestyle is the most litigated developer before Singh, appearing in three name variants totalling approximately 151 cases. Homebuyers prevailed in the overwhelming majority. Prakash Chavan (44 cases, 100% complainant wins) and Arun Bhoomi Corporation (35 cases, 97%) follow the same pattern.
#4 — Vasant Prabhu
Vasant Prabhu is the court's de facto non-compliance specialist. Of his 381 total cases, approximately 295 (77%) are Non-Compliance Applications — matters filed when a developer fails to comply with an earlier order. Only 45 of his cases are standard Complaints.
This specialisation explains an apparent paradox: Prabhu has the highest disposal rate (76.4%) of any adjudicator, yet also one of the longer average resolution times (859 days). Non-compliance proceedings involve enforcement mechanics, warrants, and repeated hearings — lengthening individual resolution even as Prabhu clears a higher share overall. His 100% clearance of all 31 Recovery Warrant matters is a strong signal of execution-phase efficiency.
Outcome metrics before Prabhu's bench require careful interpretation. The largest respondent, CCI Projects Private Limited (71 cases), produced zero complainant wins — 52 settled and 19 went to the respondent. This does not indicate bias: it reflects the enforcement nature of non-compliance applications, where outcomes may be warrants or negotiated compliance rather than binary homebuyer victories.
#5 — Gautam Chatterjee
Gautam Chatterjee presided over 2,151 cases between 2017 and 2024, achieving the second-highest disposal rate (66.0%) but the slowest average resolution time at 1,055 days — the only adjudicator to exceed a 1,000-day average. His complainant win rate of 62.1% is respectable, and his 29.6% settlement rate aligns with the court median.
Chatterjee's docket is almost entirely standard Complaints (2,063 of 2,151 cases). The prolonged resolution time is substantially shaped by his association with some of the most legally complex respondents in the dataset. Housing Development and Infrastructure Limited (HDIL), which collapsed into insolvency in 2019, is the single most litigated respondent before Chatterjee with 167 cases — 92 ending in complainant wins and 61 in respondent wins, one of the few large respondents where the developer secured a meaningful share of victories. D.S. Kulkarni Developers Limited (DSK, another distressed developer) appears in 77 cases and won 48 of them. Chatterjee's bench handled Maharashtra's most complicated real estate collapses.
Lawyers before his bench: Miloni Sanghvi leads with 71 cases and 78.9% wins. Hina Abhyankar has 31 appearances but only 3.2% wins — the lowest of any high-volume lawyer before any MahaRERA bench. Ramesh Lokhande achieved 100% wins across 22 appearances.
The Bottom 3 Performers
#6 — Manoj Saunik
Manoj Saunik, the most recently active adjudicator in the dataset (2020–2025), ranks sixth on composite performance. His disposal rate of 55.5% is below the court median, and his complainant win rate of 53.7% is the second-lowest. The most distinctive metric is his near-zero settlement rate of 6.2% — the lowest of any adjudicator by a wide margin. All other benches settled between 24.6% and 33.9% of matters. Saunik's bench consistently drives contested decisions rather than facilitating negotiated resolution.
His top respondents reveal a bifurcated picture. Calyx Spaces LLP (79 cases, 96% complainant wins) is a typical high-volume pattern. But Merino Builders alongside CIDCO (43 cases) achieved 100% respondent wins — the only high-volume developer combination in the entire dataset to win every single case before any bench. Duville Estates (22 cases) similarly secured 21 respondent wins. The coexistence of extreme complainant-favorable and respondent-favorable outcomes suggests significant variation in case strength across matters assigned to this bench.
Petitioner counsel Avinash Pawar (43 cases, 0% wins) and Sonam Singh (34 cases, 0% wins) are the largest-volume lawyers before Saunik yet have not won a single matter in the dataset — an unusual pattern warranting scrutiny of which matters these lawyers bring and against which respondents.
#7 — Ajoy Mehta
Ajoy Mehta's 1,684-case docket yields the lowest complainant win rate (51.5%) and the second-lowest disposal rate (48.3%) among MahaRERA adjudicators. Just under half of all cases filed before his bench remain pending. His average resolution time for disposed cases is 703 days. Of his 1,684 cases, 1,611 are standard Complaints — the low disposal and win rates are not explained by matter-type complexity.
Lawyers before his bench:
| Lawyer | Cases | Wins | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Advocate Aman Shukla | 75 | 73 | 97.3% |
| Godfrey Pimenta | 45 | 20 | 44.4% |
| Abir Patel | 28 | 2 | 7.1% |
| Sachin Karia | 23 | 0 | 0.0% |
| Advocate Rakesh Tailor | 22 | 17 | 77.3% |
Aman Shukla's 97.3% win rate across 75 appearances is the strongest performance of any high-volume lawyer before any MahaRERA bench. Godfrey Pimenta's 44.4% rate before Mehta — compared to his 97–99% before Kapadnis and Pathak — illustrates how caseload mix differs sharply by bench.
Top respondents: Ruparel Realty (77 cases, 95% complainant wins) is the most frequently appearing developer. The notable outlier is Runwal Constructions: in 23 cases before Mehta, Runwal won 22 and the complainant won just one — making it one of the only large developers to succeed systematically before any MahaRERA bench.
#8 — Ravindra Deshpande
Ravindra Deshpande has the smallest docket (97 cases) and the lowest disposal rate (36.1%) of any MahaRERA adjudicator. With a case record spanning from 2013 to 2025, his presence suggests a limited or part-time adjudicating role. His complainant win rate (57.4%) and average resolution time (344 days) sit at mid-table, but the 97-case base makes these figures statistically less reliable. Fortune Vastushilpa Developers LLP is his largest respondent with 13 cases (8 complainant wins, 5 respondent wins). Petitioner-side counsel Nisha leads with 10 cases and 100% wins.
Key Takeaways
The data points to five headline conclusions.
Speed and volume are not in opposition. Mahesh Pathak handles the second-largest caseload and achieves the fastest average resolution time. Caseload size alone does not explain sluggishness.
Specialisation shapes performance. Vasant Prabhu's non-compliance focus yields the highest disposal rate precisely because enforcement matters have clear remedies once heard. His bench is optimised for a different task than the standard complaint benches.
Complainant outcomes vary significantly by bench. A homebuyer before B.D. Kapadnis wins 77.7% of contested decisions. Before Ajoy Mehta, that drops to 51.5% — a 26-percentage-point gap that is material in any individual case. The RERA Act offers no mechanism by which parties can choose their adjudicator; bench assignment is effectively random.
Developer outcomes are highly bench-specific. Some developers lose routinely regardless of assignment. Others — Runwal Constructions before Mehta, Merino Builders alongside CIDCO before Saunik — have succeeded at rates that stand out sharply and warrant deeper case-level scrutiny.
Legacy insolvency cases distort individual bench metrics. Gautam Chatterjee's 1,055-day average is partly a function of HDIL and DSK Developers — Maharashtra's two most prominent real estate insolvencies — being concentrated in his docket. Raw resolution-time metrics must be read alongside the complexity of the respondent pool.
For homebuyers, lawyers, and developers navigating proceedings before the regulator, bench assignment is not merely a procedural detail. It is a material factor in how long a case takes, whether it settles, and whether the complainant is likely to prevail on the merits.