Advocates appeared:
For the Appellant(s) : Mr. Chetan Pathak, Adv. Mr. Sanath Parashar, Adv. Mr. Akhil Kumar, Adv. Mr. Dhairya Verenkar, Adv. Mr. Gautam Awasthi, AOR Mr. Ashish Datta, Adv.
For the Respondent(s): Mr. K M Nataraj, A.S.G. Mr. Akshay Amritanshu, Adv. Mr. Pranay Ranjan, Adv. Mr. Arkaj Kumar, Adv. Ms. Khushboo Kapur, Adv. Mr. Pratyush Srivastava, Adv. Mr. Arvind Kumar Sharma, AOR Mr. Sunny Choudhary, AOR Mr. Vikas Bansal, Adv. Mr. Manoj Kumar, Adv.

The case involves a dispute over an agreement to sell property executed on February 4, 1988, between the plaintiff and the defendant. The plaintiff claims to have been put into possession of the property pursuant to this agreement. The defendant, however, denied the existence of the agreement. The plaintiff sought to file a copy of the agreement as secondary evidence in a suit for specific performance. Initially, the court allowed this, but later reviewed the decision and held that the secondary evidence was inadmissible because the original agreement was not properly stamped, thus invoking the bar under the relevant stamp duty law (!) (!) .

The plaintiff challenged this review order and the constitutional validity of the applicable stamp duty section. The case then proceeded through various courts, examining whether the agreement needed to be stamped at the time of execution, and whether the document could be admitted as secondary evidence given its stamp status. The core issue was whether the agreement, executed in 1988, was subject to stamp duty under the law as amended later, and whether the secondary evidence could be admitted if the original was not properly stamped.

The factual matrix also includes the fact that the defendant claimed the original agreement was with her counsel and could not be recovered, which raised questions about the admissibility of secondary evidence. The legal proceedings involved detailed consideration of the applicable law regarding the timing of stamp duty liability, the nature of secondary evidence, and the interpretation of amendments and explanations in the law related to documents executed prior to certain amendments. Ultimately, the courts examined whether the agreement was liable for stamp duty at the time of execution and whether secondary evidence could be admitted under the law, given the circumstances of the case.