If a plaint, read meaningfully, discloses that the suit is barred by limitation or fails to establish a valid cause of action due to strategic or clever drafting, the court must reject the plaint at the threshold to prevent the abuse of the legal process.

CAV JUDGMENT

1. Rule. Learned advocate for the respondent waives service of Rule.

A. PROLOGUE:-

2. The petitioner, invoking the revisional jurisdiction of this Court under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (for short, “the Code”), calls in question the judgment and order rendered below Exh.18 in Special Civil Suit No.36 of 2015, whereby the application preferred under Order VII Rule 11 of the Code came to be rejected by the learned 8th Additional Senior Civil Judge, Vadodara.

B. LITIGATION HISTORY:-

3. Shorn of non-essential details, the relevant factual matrix of the lis in hand is adumbrated thus: The applicant, original defendant in Special Civil Suit No.36 of 2016, had instituted an application below Exh.18 under Order VII Rule 11(a) and (d) of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, seeking rejection of the plaint on the ground that the suit was ex facie not maintainable. The dispute pertains to land bearing Revenue Survey No.187/2 paiki situated at Village Tandalja, admeasuring 0-49-58 sq. mtrs. The respondents–original plaintiffs alleged that the applicant had, pursuant to an agreement to sell dated 10.01.2003 executed with the original owner, obtained development permissions, Rajachithi, and N.A. permission, and thereafter carved out 72 plots on the said land.

3.1. It is the case of the respondents that in August 2008, the applicant entered into an oral agreement to sell 63 out of the 72 plots to them for a total consideration of Rs.52,30,000/-, and that payments aggregating to Rs.22,00,000/- were made between 19.08.2008 and 27.10.2008. They further averred that although the applicant subsequently settled the pending litigation with the original owner and obtained a registered sale deed in his own favour on 20.09.2010, he refused to execute sale deeds for the 63 plots agreed to be sold and instead commenced a development scheme styled “Afia Park Duplex.”

3.2. The applicant, however, contends that the aforesaid averments are wholly false, contrary to the established legal position. It is asserted that title to the land vested in him only upon execution of the registered sale deed in 2010; ergo, the alleged oral agreement of 2008 is void ab initio in light of the trite principle nemo dat quod non habet, as well as the provisions of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882 and the Indian Contract Act, 1872 . It is his further case that the suit filed in 2015 is ex facie barred by limitation and that the plaint, bereft of any sustainable cause of action, deserved rejection under Order VII Rule 11 of the Code. The learned Additional Senior Civil Judge, however, vide impugned order dated 30.12.2016, rejected the application below Exh.18, giving rise to the present revision under Section 115 of the Code.

C. SUBMISSION OF THE PETITIONERS:-

4. Learned advocate, Mr. S.P. Majmudar, appearing for the petitioner, has vehemently contended that the plaintiff has instituted the civil suit seeking specific performance of an alleged oral contract purportedly entered into between the parties. A consequential relief of permanent injunction has also been sought, the plaintiff asserting that the cause of action for instituting the suit first arose sometime in the years 2009–2010.

4.1. It is further submitted that, upon a plain, meaningful, and holistic reading of the plaint, the suit instituted in the year 2015 for specific performance of the purported oral agreement concerning the disputed property is ex facie barred by limitation, Article 54 of the Limitation Act, 1963 being squarely attracted to the factual milieu of the lis. Learned advocate urges that the plaintiff, by resorting to deft, nay, adroit draftsmanship, has attempted to project that the cause of action arose only on 20.09.2010, when the defendant executed a registered sale deed in favour of a third party and when construction of the project styled as ‘Afia Park Duplex’ commenced thereupon—events which, according to the plaintiff, signified an explicit refusal by the def