IMPORTANT POINTS
(1) Registration of sale-deed – Under-valuation of sale-deeds – Determination of market value without Notice of hearing to parties is liable to be set aside.
(2) Registration of sale-deed – It is not permissible for Registering Officer to undertake a roving enquiry for the purpose of ascertaining correct market value of property.

ORDER

1. Leave granted.

2. These appeals are at the instance of the Chief Revenue Controlling Officer-cum-the-Inspector General of Registration and two other Revenue Officers, seeking to challenge the judgment and order passed by the High Court of Judicature at Madras dated 2-9-2015 in CMA Nos.973/2010 & 2534/2012 respectively by which the High Court allowed the civil miscellaneous appeals filed by the respondent – herein under Section 47-A(10) of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899 (for short, “the Stamp Act”) and thereby quashed and set aside the order passed by the Chief Revenue Controlling Officer-cum-the- Inspector General of Registration with respect to the stamp valuation.

3. The subject matter of this litigation is the valuation shown in the two Sale Deeds registered as DOC No.487/02 dated 5-9-2002 and 488/02 dated 2-9-2000 respectively.

4. The respondent – herein is the purchaser. He got the two sale deeds executed through the original owner of the property in question. The market value of the entire property covered in both the sale deeds is Rs.1,20,000/- and Rs.1,30,000/- respectively. It appears that the Joint Sub-Registrar, Tindivanam on receipt of the two registered sale deeds declined to release the documents on the premise that the sale consideration shown in the two sale deeds was under-valued.

5. The matter was accordingly referred by the Joint Sub-Registrar to the Special Deputy Collector (Stamps) under Section 47-(A)(10) of the Act for the purpose of determining the correct market value of the property. It also issued notice in Form-I fixing the value of the properties in DOC No.487/2002 at Rs.45,66,660/- and property in DOC No.488/2002 at Rs.12,94,900/- respectively.

6. The Special Deputy Collector (Stamps) on conclusion of the inquiry fixed the market value of the property covered under DOC No.488/2002 at Rs.10,36,937/- and the property covered under DOC No.487/2002 at Rs.51,16,600/-.

7. The respondent – herein being dissatisfied with the order passed by the Special Deputy Collector (Stamps) preferred a statutory appeal before the Inspector General of Registration. The appeal came to be dismissed.

8. In such circumstances, referred to above, the respondent – herein went before the High Court by filing Civil Miscellaneous Appeals under Section 47(A)(10) of the Stamp Act.

9. The High Court allowed both the appeals and thereby quashed and set aside the orders passed by the authorities below.

10. The appellants feeling dissatisfied with the impugned judgment and order passed by the High Court have come up before this Court with the present appeals.

11. We have heard Mr. Sabarish Subramanian, the learned counsel appearing for the appellants and Ms. Rohini Musa, the learned counsel appearing for the respondent.

12. We take notice of the fact that the High Court while allowing the Civil Miscellaneous Appeals has observed in paras 20 and 21 respectively as under:-

“20. That being the legal position, if the contention raised on the side of the learned counsel appearing for the Appellant is appreciated in the legal proposition, as above laid down by the Supreme Court, Full Bench, Division Bench and Single Judges of our High Court, it would compel this court to hold that the proceedings referring the documents for determination of the market value, without recording any reason to say that the document is undervalued, thus without performing the statutory obligation, cast upon the third Respondent Registering Officer, to record such reasons to arrive at a decision that the documents are undervalued and the same are required to be referred to the authority concerned to determine the actual market value of the property is contrary to the procedure laid down under law and is ex facie, illegal. Furthermore, no material is made available to show that the third Respondent/ Registering Officer, on the basis of such material, arrived at the conclusion that the true value is not set forth in the documents. In the absence of one such material, the