JUDGMENT

G. C. Mathur, J. - The plaintiff filed document 74C-1 bearing stamp of Rs. 2.25/- and document 76A-1 bearing stamp of Rs. 2.00. The defendant made an application for impounding the documents contending that they were either sale deeds or release deeds and were insufficiently stamped. The plaintiff contended that the documents were merely agreements and were sufficiently stamped. The Munsif was of the opinion that the documents were either sale deeds or release deeds and not merely agreements. He, however, refused to impound them on the ground that they did not constitute either a valid transfer or valid surrender in the eye of law. He was of opinion that the executant's of the documents did not appear to have any rights in the land which they could transfer and, therefore, the documents were ineffective and invalid. Against the order of the Munsif, the defendant has filed this revision.

2. The Munsif has relied upon a Full Bench decision of the Madras High Court in Crompton Engineering Co., (Madras) Ltd. v. Chief Controlling Revenue Authority, Madras, A.I.R. 1953 Madias 764. In this case, the question was whether the document was a mortgage deed as defined under Sec. 2 (17) of the Stamp Act and was liable to duty as such. The document was not attested and not registered and, as such, could not operate as a valid mortgage. The Full Bench held that the document was not liable to stamp duty as a mortgage. The Full Bench made the following observations :-

"The very difference between the definition of an instrument in Sec. 2 (14) and a mortgage deed in Sec. 2 (17) should show that the "transfer" provided for in Sec. 2 (17) is a transfer valid in law. To make a document liable to stamp duty as a mortgage deed, it is not enough if the document purports to effect a transfer. It must "transfer".

The Munsif, following these observations, held that the two documents in the present case were not valid transfers in law and did not, in fact, transfer any property. This decision was explained in a subsequent Full Bench decision of the Madras High Court, in The Chief Controlling Revenue Authority Madras, Board of Revenue, Madras, Referring Officer v. The Canara Industrial and Banking Syndicate Ltd., Madras, A.I.R. 1969 Madras 1. It was held in this case that a document has to be considered as chargeable to stamp duty when it is executed according to the definition in Sec. 2(12). This Full Bench held that non-registration of a document does not affect the liability of the document to stamp duty under the Stamp Act. The general observations made by the 1953 Full Bench quoted above, were confined to the facts of that case. A Full Bench of the Andhra Pradesh High Court held in Bazrami Gangaram v. Kamlabai, A.I.R. 1968 Andhra Pradesh 213. :-

"For the purposes of the Stamp Act, the crucial time for determining whether an instrument chargeable with duty is duly stamped or not is before or at the t me of its execution and apart from its execution, no other formalities under any other law need be satisfied. There is no warrant for the importation of the requirements of either the Transfer of Property Act or the Registration Act to construe the documents or instruments under the Stamp Act as the latter Act itself specifically defines the terms used therein. To hold that an instrument must be a valid one under law before it is liable to stamp duty will be to ignore the requirements of the definition or to make them otiose."

In this case, a mortgage deed which was unregistered was held to be liable to stamp duty.

3. The two documents filed in the present case did not suffer from any defect of execution. They were unregistered but that was immaterial for the purposes of stamp duty. The only question for consideration is whether the Court was entitled to see whether the documents were effective and valid before holsind that they were liable to stamp duty. It is necessary to notice some of the provisions of the Indian Stamp Act in order to decide this