ORDER :

In all these batch of Writ Petitions the common question that arise for consideration is whether the registering authorities under the Registration Act, 1908, are entitled to refuse to receive and register the document presented for registration before such authority on the ground that the link document through which the executants of the said document are claiming right and title that is sought to be transferred under such document presented for the registration is an unregistered validated document under Section 42 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899 or not ? Hence, all the Writ Petitions are heard together and are disposed of by this common order.

2. Heard Sri. A.Narasimha Rao, Sri D.Y.L.N Charyulu, Sri M.A.K Mukheed, and Sri L.Ravinder, learned counsel for the petitioners and Sri P.Raja Sripathi Rao, learned Government Pleader for Stamps and Registration, for respondents in all the Writ Petitions.

3. Before dealing with the question that is sought to be answered in this batch of Writ Petitions, it is necessary to note that the Writ Petition No.16310 of 2019, was earlier allowed by a learned Single Judge of this Court, by an order, dated 23.02.2021, wherein it was held that once the document is validated by collecting the Stamp Duty, it is not open for the respondents to declare the validated document as a document without having force of law and rejection to register the document by referring to the validated document is ex facie illegal.

4. Aggrieved thereby, the State filed Writ Appeal No.446 of 2021 and judgment of the learned Single Judge was set aside by a Division Bench of this Court, by an order, dated 27.09.2021, reversing the finding of the learned Single Judge, that the validated document will have all the force of law and declared that mere validation of a document will not cure the defect of non-registration of such document, under Section 17 of the Registration Act, 1908, and in the absence of registration of a document which is compulsorily registerable, mere validation will not affect the immovable properties comprised therein. The relevant paragraphs from the judgment of learned Division Bench are extracted hereunder for clarity:-

“In view of this settled legal position, the view of the learned Single Judge that once a document is validated, it attains the legal force of law and it cannot have any secondary grade recognition cannot be accepted as correct statement of law.

Without registration, a sale deed or any document required under Section 17 of the Act or under the Transfer of Property Act, 1882, even if it is properly stamped, cannot affect the immovable property comprised therein.

An insufficiently stamped sale deed or other document required by Section 17 of the Act to be registered or by Transfer of Property Act, 1882 to be registered, if properly stamped by getting it validated can only be used as evidence of any collateral transaction not required to be affected by registered instrument or received as evidence for a contract in a suit for specific performance under the Specific Relief Act, and for no other purposes.”

5. Having held as above, the learned Division Bench remanded the matter back for considering the other contentions raised by the Writ Petitioners about the validity of the impugned refusal order therein, refusing registration of the document presented for registration. That is how Writ Petition No.16310 of 2019, is listed for disposal before this Court. As the other Writ Petitions in this batch involve the similar issue, the same are tagged along with Writ Petition No.16310 of 2019, for disposal.

6. As could be seen from the impugned refusal order, passed by the respondent-Sub Registrar, the reason for refusing to register the documents which are the subject matter of the respective Writ Petitions is that the link document referred to in the respective documents as source of title of the executants of the respective documents is a document validated under the provisions of the Indian Stamp