Till the projects get requisite approvals and construction begins, the investors' money is at stake. Many a times, the approvals take a long time to come and the projects get delayed. "We invested Rs 3 lakh in a hitech city project when they were first announced more than two years ago. We have no idea what is going on there," said Satish Kumar Verma, working with a public sector firm. Experts say that most of the bigger developers do keep their promises because their credibility is at stake. If they get the land and the necessary approvals, they do make allotments to the registered people or return their money with interest.

"We do try to keep an eye on such clandestine offers. A foolproof mechanism needs to be developed and concerted effort has to be made to keep a check. Apart from that, public awareness also needs to be created to ensure that companies do not cheat gullible investors," said Ghaziabad Development Authority's chief architect and town planner S.K. Zaman.

In Ghaziabad, cheating cases have been registered against two companies - Seven heavens and N.R.Buildcon - for offering land through pre-launch, collecting money and then vanishing. Many more developers have been put under the scanner but nothing concrete has come out against them, a senior police officer said.

"There are orders from the state government to register cheating cases in pre-launch offers. The complaint can either come directly from the individuals or through the development authority said Ghazi ," abad district's senior superintendent of police Deepak Ratan.