R.S. Ramanathan, J.

1. The plaintiffs in O.S. No. 6689 of 1996 on the file of the III Additional City Civil Court, Chennai, are the appellants.

2. The plaintiffs filed the suit for specific performance of agreement of sale and that suit was dismissed and aggrieved by the same, the Appeal Suit is filed by the plaintiffs/ appellants.

3. The case of the plaintiffs/appellants is as follows:-

The plaintiffs 1 and 2 and the husband of the 4th plaintiff are the employees of Indian Bank and on seeing the advertisement in 'THE HINDU' given by the first defendant, offering the suit property for sale at Rs. 1.40 lakhs per ground, the plaintiffs approached the first defendant and expressed their willingness to purchase the suit property and the first defendant also informed that he was the owner of the suit property and there was no encumbrance and the plaintiffs informed that they would get loan from the Indian Bank Housing Finance for purchasing the suit property and that was also agreed by the first defendant and the first defendant gave necessary documents for applying loan for the plaintiffs to pay the sale consideration. The sale consideration for the suit property was fixed at Rs. 3,10,000/- and Rs. 60,000/- was paid as advance and an agreement of sale was entered into between the plaintiffs and the first defendant on 15.06.1988. The first defendant informed that he was the owner of the suit property and he purchased the same under a registered sale deed, dated 06.12.1982 from T.K. Singaram, Ravi Chandrika Badrinath and Jayanthi Prabhakaran and also gave the copy of the sale deed, dated 06.12.1982 in favour of the plaintiffs. He also informed that his vendors had handed over 1654 sq. meters of land to the Director of Land Ceiling Authorities and there was no problem for registering the sale deed and there was no prohibition under the Tamil Nadu Urban Land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act, for conveying the good title. After the agreement was entered into, the plaintiffs applied to the Corporation for sub-division of the suit property and for building permission and they were informed that clearance from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities were not obtained and one Sri Gabriel Kuriakose purchased adjacent land to an extent of 2 grounds 600 sq. feet from the first defendant and he applied for planning permission and that planning permission was not approved as clearance from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities was not obtained and therefore, the plaintiffs approached the first defendant to get the clearance from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities. The first defendant agreed and also made an endorsement in the agreement of sale deed, dated 15.06.1988 stating that the time for completing the contract is extended for a further period of one month from the date of obtaining clearance from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities and thereafter, no steps were taken and the plaintiffs sent a notice, dated 10.02.1989 requesting the first defendant to get the Clearance Certificate from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities and at that time, the first defendant sent a reply stating that he never agreed to get clearance from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities and he agreed to get the clearance from the Urban Land Tax Authorities and that was stated in the endorsement also. The first defendant also informed the plaintiffs that the 2nd defendant, one of the vendors of the first defendant, filed W.P. No. 2553 of 1981 claiming exemption from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities and that writ petition was dismissed, he filed WA No. 591 of 1989 and that was pending in the High Court and informed that exemption or clearance certificate would be obtained and also shows the letter issued by the Urban Land Ceiling Authorities addressed to the Assistant Executive Engineer, Corporation of Chennai in that regard. The plaintiffs sent another notice, dated 05.04.1989 to the first defendant requesting him to get clearance certificate from the Urban Land Ceiling Authorit