Andhra Pradesh High Court
Judges : B.SUDERSHAN REDDY, G.ROHINI
P.Purushotham Reddy - Appellant
Versus
Pratap Steels Ltd - Respondent
C.C.C.A.No.80/93
Decided On : 07-22-02
Advocates Appeared :
Mr.Vilas V. Afzalpurkar,Mr.P.M. Gopal Rao
Contention that parties mutually agreed to extend period for obtaining requisite permission - Letter addressed by plaintiff to defendant stating, “we extend the said time period without any additional liability on you” brought into existence in order to suite claim of plaintiff - Unilateral extension of time cannot be construed as agreement to extend time by mutual consent - Intention to make time as essence of contract must be express in unequivocal language - When parties agree and prescribe certain time limit for taking steps by one or other party it must have some significance and cannot be ignored altogether on ground the time was not made essence of contract - In the instant case parties specifically agreed time to be essence of contract - Defendants addressed letter to plaintiff informing that agreement stands cancelled as they could not be obtain exemption by stipulated time and also enclosing cheques towards earnest money.
Suit filed without even issuing prior notice to defendants - Party who seeks to avail equitable jurisdiction of Court must come to Court with clean hands - Plaintiff deliberately avoided to receive letter addressed by defendants - Since plaintiff not approached Court with clean hands, not entited for equitable relief of specific performance - Taking into consideration rapid increase in price and value of urban properties, grant of specific relief in the instant case would be unjust - Plaintiff miserably failed to establish its capacity to perform contract and to make out any case of grant of specific relief - Grant of such relief would be oppressive and would result in serious injustice - Plaintiff is entitled to refund of earnest money only with interest - Decree and judgment of lower Court, set aside.
( 1 ) THE defendants in O. S. No. 1159 of 1989 on the lic of the V Additional Judge, City Civil court, Hyderabad are the appellants. The respondent s suit for specific performance has been decreed by the trial Court.
( 2 ) FOR the sake of convenience, the parties shall be referred to as plaintiff and defendants throughout this appeal.
( 3 ) ON 31 -10-1987 an agreement for sale was entered into between the defendants and the plaintiff, whereunder they agreed to sell and purchase the house property together with the land admeasuring 4820 sq. metres for a consideration of Rs. 40,25,000. 00 (Forty lakhs twenty five thousan ). In all a sum of Rs. 6 lakhs (six lakhs) has been paid by the plaintiff as and by way of earnest money. The plaintiff agreed to pay a further sum of Rs. 2 lakhs (two lakhs) to the defendants as and by way of further earnest money before 15-12-1987. The balance of sale consideration of Rs. 32,25,000. 00 (thirty two lakhs twenty five thousand) to be paid by the plaintiff to the defendants before the registering Officer at the time of registration of the document.
( 4 ) THE relevant recitals of the agreement, which may have an important bearing on the issues that arise for consideration, reads as follows : (1) and (2 ). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (3) It is hereby expressly agreed that the vendors will at their own cost and on their own responsibility obtain, if necessary, exemption from the State Government under the provisions of the Urban Land (Celling and Regulation) Act, 1976 in respect of the entire house property, and also permission of the Competent Authority under the said act, if necessary, for the sale of the said house property together with all the buildings standing thereon, which are the subject -matter of this agreement, before the 30/06/1988. (4) to (6 ). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ;. (7) The time for obtaining the said exemptions and permissions will, if necessary, be extended by mutual agreement of both the parties. However if the Vendors are not able to get the said Urban Land Ceiling sanction within the stipulated period they shall return the said earnest money so paid by the purchaser within 3 months thereafter or 3 months after the expiry pf such extended time, as the case may be, without any interest. If for any reason whatsoever the said amount of earnest money is not paid by the vendors to the purchaser within the stipulated period, the Vendors undertake to pay to the purchaser interest at 12% p. a. from the expiry of the said stipulated period till the entire amount is cleared, on the said amount or such balance thereof as may be outstanding. Apart from the refund of the said earnest money in the manner aforesaid the purchaser shall not have any claim or demand against the Vendors. (8 ). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (9) It is hereby expressly agreed between the parties that If for any reason the requisite exemption/permission under the Urban land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act, 1976 as aforesaid shall not be forthcoming by 30/06/1988 or within such extended period as may be mutually agreed to, this agreement shall become inoperative and unenforceable and in such an event the Vendors shall refund to the Purchaser the said earnest money, paid by the Purchasers to the vendors without any interest within a period of 3 months thereafter. Only thereupon the Vendors shall be at liberty to sell the said house property to any third party and the Purchaser shall have no right or claim demand or objection to the same.
( 5 ) WE may also notice that either to Ex. A-1-agreement for sale dt. 31-10-1987 the parties have entered into an agreement for sale with regard to the same property on 26-09-1986. The total consideration as per the agreement was Rs. 30 lakhs (thirty lakhs ). An amount of Rs. 3 lakhs (three lakhs) was paid in two instalments of Rs. 51,000. 00 (fifty one thousands) and Rs. 2,49,000. 00 (Two lakhs forty nine thousand
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