Court Fee--When main relief sought in the suit is cancellation of deed and any other relief if is inconsequential then advalorem court fee would not be payable.

Mrs. Daya Chaudhary, J.;- This order of mine shall dispose of three Civil Revision Nos.3627 of 2016, 4068 of 2016 and 4071 of 2016 as common question of law and facts are involved. However, for the sake of convenience, the facts are being derived from Civil Revision No.3627 of 2016.

2. The present revision petition has been filed under Article 227 of the Constitution of India for setting aside the impugned order dated 06.04.2016 passed by Civil Judge (Junior Division), Kurukshetra, whereby, the application of the petitioner filed under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC has been dismissed.

3. Briefly, the facts of the case, as made out in the petition, are that plaintiff-respondent No.1-Premo Devi filed a suit for mandatory injunction with consequential relief of permanent injunction. The prayer in the suit was for permanent injunction restraining the defendants from dispossessing the plaintiff from the suit property and using the alleged agreement, which was executed by the defendants under threat and in an illegal manner, with a decree for mandatory injunction directing the defendants to return the agreement to sell of property of the plaintiff. An application was moved by the defendant-Balwan Singh under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC for rejection of suit by mentioning that the plaint has been drafted in a very clever manner just to avoid the court fee. It was also mentioned in the application that the agreement to sell is legal and binding upon the plaintiff and in case, the plaintiff refuses to execute the sale deed in favour of defendant-Balwan Singh, then he is entitled to get the sale deed executed and registered through Court. Hence, the plaintiff is required to affix advalorem court fees. Said application was dismissed vide order dated 06.04.2016 by holding that plaintiff is not required to affix ad-valorem court fees as the relief sought is for cancellation of agreement to sell.

4. The order dated 06.04.2016 has been challenged by the defendant-petitioner by raising various grounds i.e the plaintiff has drafted the plaint with clever device and in stead of filing the suit for cancellation of contract, he has filed a suit for mandatory injunction asking the relief for returning the agreement to sell to the plaintiff/respondent No.1. It has been done just to avoid the affixation of ad valorem court fees. The intention of the plaintiff is to get the agreement to sell cancelled to avoid the execution of sale deed in favour of defendant No.1. It is also the argument of learned counsel for the petitioner that the observation of the learned trial Court that no ad-valorem court fee is payable by the plaintiff as the agreement to sell has been sought to be cancelled in the civil suit and it does not confer any right, is totally wrong, incorrect and the same is not in consonance with the settled position of law. In case of cancellation of a deal, the court fee is required to be paid on the consideration mentioned therein. Learned counsel also submits that the respondents cannot avoid the payment of ad-valorem court fee as they were party to the deed and they are bound to pay the advalorem court fees. The judgment relied upon by the learned trial Court, while dismissing the application, is not applicable to the facts and circumstances of the case.

5. Learned counsel for the respondents submits that the impugned order does not require any interference as the order has been passed with detailed reasoning. The suit relates to agreement to sell and the plaintiff is not required to affix any court fee as a relief sought is for cancellation of agreement to sell.

6. Heard the arguments of learned counsel for the parties and have also perused the impugned order as well as other documents on the file.

7. Learned trial Court, while dismissing the application filed by the petitioner under Order 7 Rule 11 CPC, has observed as under :-

“ Admittedly, an agreement to sell can not be said to be “Instrument securing property” or it does not assure vesting right of th