The court established that independent lease deeds cannot be aggregated for stamp duty calculations, and the existence of an alternative statutory remedy precludes the invocation of writ jurisdiction.

ORDER

1. The petitioner has filed the present writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India with the following prayers:-

'(i) the order dated 20.08.2019 (Annexure-7), the recovery notice dated 26.08.2019 (Annexure-8) and all subsequent proceedings initiated thereunder may kindly be quashed and set aside;

(ii) all the subsequent proceedings initiated in relation to the case no.120/2018 instituted before the DIG Stamps, Barmer may kindly be quashed and set aside;

(iii) Any other appropriate order or direction, which this Hon'ble Court considers just and proper in the facts and circumstances of this case, may kindly be passed in favour of the applicant.'

2. The facts apropos to the case are that the petitioner No.2 is a company, which was desirous to run a hotel and thus, it approached the petitioner No.1 to lease out the property, namely, Fort Pokaran, owned by the petitioner No.1 and accordingly a lease-deed (Annex.1) was executed on 16.09.1997 for a period of 20 years.

3. During the lease period, the petitioner No.2 was running hotel business. In the year 2014, the petitioner No.2 also ventured into the business of art and craft and since the scope of the lease-deed (Annex.1) was only to the extent of running of hotel business, it was decided to terminate the earlier lease-deed dated 16.09.1997 (Annex.1) and to execute a fresh lease-deed to run the hotel business as well as business of art and craft. In view of the aforesaid, a cancellation-deed was executed on 11.04.2014 (Annex.2) whereby the earlier lease-deed dated 16.09.1997 was cancelled and possession of the property in question was handed over to the petitioner No.1 by the petitioner No.2. Thereafter, both the parties agreed to execute a fresh lease-deed and accordingly a fresh lease-deed dated 11.04.2014 (Annex.3) was executed and the petitioner No.2 was permitted to run hotel business as well as the business of art and craft.

4. In the year 2017, the office of Accountant General undertook inspection of the documents along with the registered documents maintained by the respondent No.2 and respondent No.3 at their respective offices and during inspection, an audit objection with regard to the lease-deed dated 11.04.2014 (Annex.3) was raised stating inter alia that since the lease-deed dated 11.04.2014 is effective from 07.04.2014 for a period of 19 years, which will make it a continuous lease of the earlier lease dated 16.09.1997 and since the cumulative period under the these leases is more than 20 years, the same would amount of perpetual lease and the stamp duty as well as registration charges etc. would be payable on the document as a conveyance. In light of the said audit objection, a notice dated 15.02.2017 (Annex.4) was served upon the petitioner No.2.

5. The petitioner No.2 filed detailed reply to the notice (Annex.4) and submitted that operation and effect of the earlier lease-deed dated 16.09.1997 was cancelled by way of cancellation-deed dated 11.04.2014. It was also submitted that operation of the lease-deed dated 11.04.2014 was to be made effective from 17.04.2014 but due to inadvertent error and bona fide mistake, it was mentioned as 07.04.2014 instead of 17.04.2014.

6. Thereafter, the respondent authorities decided the matter vide order dated 20.08.2019 (Annex.7) and without even supplying the certified copy of the order aforesaid, issued a recovery notice dated 26.08.2019 (Annex.8) to which reply (Annex.9) was filed. It is also stated that the petitioners executed correction-deeds in the lease-deed dated 11.04.2014 and cancellation-deed dated 11.04.2014. However, the respondents did not pay any heed. Hence, this petition.

7. Learned counsel for the petitioners submits that it is trite law that while calculating the stamp duty over a document, the document per se is to be examined. He submits that as per the provisions of Article 33(a)(ii) of the schedule appended to the Act of 1998, the stamp duty on the lease-deed executed for a term exceeding 20