Mandatory provisions regarding lease agreements must be strictly followed, and witnessing a document does not equate to execution by all required parties.

JUDGMENT :

Vipin Chandra Dixit, J.

1. Heard learned counsel appearing on behalf of the parties.

2. This is a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India wherein the petitioner is aggrieved by the rejection of his complaint dated 24.01.2024 filed with the respondent no.2 with regard to the illegal selection of the respondent no.3.

3. The facts of the case are that the respondent no.3 was chosen in draw of lots with respect to location no.1375 for retail outlet dealership. The main complaint of the petitioner is that the respondent no.3 had offered a leased property which did not comply with the mandatory provision laid down under Clause 4 (vi) (a) of the Brochure June, 2023 which reads as under:-

"The other conditions with respect to offering of land are as under:-

a) The land should be available with the applicant as on the date of application and should have minimum lease of 19 years and 11 months (as advertised by respective oil company) from the date or after the date of advertisement but not later than the date of application. If the offered land is on Long-term lease and there are multiple owners, then lease deed should be executed by all co-owners of the offered plot. Incase lease deed is not executed by all co-owners' such lease deed shall be treated as invalid."

4. Sri Anshul Kumar Singhal, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner has submitted that the lease deed was signed by only one of the co-owners while the other co-owners witnessed the lease deed. His further argument is that two lease deeds had been filed by the respondent no.3 dated 24.7.2023 and 18.9.2023. He submits that the subsequent deed was treated as the final lease deed. He submits that the subsequent deed was not an amendment of the first deed but was treated as such by the respondent no.2.

5. Sri Ashish Kumar Singh, learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no.3 has submitted that the purpose of the relevant clause is only to ensure no future litigation between the parties. He submits that since the other co-owners have signed as witnesses to the lease deeds, they had in effect concurred with the said lease deed, and in a manner of speaking, acted as confirming parties. He relies on the judgment of the Supreme Court in Poonam Verma and others Vs. Delhi Development Authority reported in (2007) 13 SCC 154 (paras 26 to 28 of the judgment).

6. Learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent nos.1 and 2 has also supported the learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no.3 and submitted that both the lease deeds that were provided were dated before the cut off date, and accordingly, they have accepted the subsequent deed.

7. Upon consideration of the submissions made by the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the parties and upon perusal of the materials on record, we are unable to digest the reasoning provided by the respondent no.2 while dealing with the complaint filed by the petitioner. No specific reason has been provided by the respondent no.2 as to why the second lease deed was to be accepted as the amended lease deed. Secondly, the respondent no.2 has stated that the co-owners having witnessed the lease deed would meet the dealer selection guidelines.

8. First of all, there is merit in the argument of the learned counsel for the petitioner that when an earlier lease deed was in existence, a second lease deed could not have been executed without cancelling the first lease deed. The second lease deed in fact does not speak of any amendment but is a fresh lease deed. This procedure by itself appears to be incor