The Court determined that the document in question was an agreement rather than a bond based on its recitals and past obligations.

JUDGMENT Devan Ramachandran, J.

The petitioner challenges Ext.P4 order of the learned Family Court, Ernakulam, in OP No.1821/2019, whereby, a document produced by the respondent has been found to be properly stamped; and therefore, not necessary to be impounded.

2. Sri.T.K.Radhakrishnan - learned counsel for the petitioner, argued that, when the covenants of the document are as available in paragraph 2 of the impugned order, the learned Family Court could not have entered a finding that “the present document is not a bond and it is only and agreement.”(sic) He vehemently argued that when the document shows that the executant is the same, namely his client, who had bound himself to return the money and articles on demand to the person making such demand; it ought to have been construed only as a ‘bond’.

3. We notice from Ext.P4 that the learned Family Court has considered the afore contention in its right perspective; and its opinion is available in paragraph No.4 thereof, which is as under:

On going to the recitals in the document it can be seen that it cannot be a promissory note since it is not payable to bearer or holder, even though there is a promise to pay the money and gold ornaments. With respect to the contention that it is a bond, the document would not show that the liability has been created by the document itself. The document specifically says with respect to an pre-

existing liability the document has been written. The date ‘05.07.2018' mentioned in the document may be the date when the document was actually executed. If the amount and gold ornaments were obtained as per the document definitely, it would have been mentioned that the gold ornaments and money received by virtue of the document. Therefore, the receipt of money and gold ornaments was a past event even before the execution of the document. Therefore, it is not a bond and only an agreement. The position is clear from the decision of Hon'ble High Court in Mathayi Mathew v. Thampi ( 1989 KHC 37 ), Sreedharan v. Gopi ( 2003 KHC 420 ), and Radha v. Sankaranarayanan ( 2007 KHC 3377 ). The decision produced by the learned counsel for the respondent Jagadeesh v. A.K.Thomas ( 2016 (2) KHC 457 ) is with respect to some other document and the dispute was whether it was a promissory note or a bond and in that ease the recital was ‘on demand I will pay ₹ 22,00,000/, I have borrowed from you with interest at ₹ 3 per ₹ 100 per month and attested by two witnesses. In that case it was held that it is a bond because it does not contain the words 'order of or the bearer' and the same is attested by a witness. In this case the marital relationship between the petitioner and respondent was prior to the above document and in their joint life the document was executed. Therefore it is clear that the present document is not a bond and it is only an agreement and there is no need to impound the document. The stamp duty paid on the document is proper.

4. Admittedly, the document was produced by the respondent, in which the petitioner offered to return to her an amount of Rs.26,10,000/-, along with 6.5 sovereigns of gold of hers, which allegedly comprised of her patrimony.

5. We cannot bring the afore covenants to be within the ambit of a ‘bond’; and, as rightly found by the learned Family Court, it can only be taken as an agreement to return what he had received earlier, except that it uses the words ‘on demand’. This, by itself, does not give the document the character of a ‘bond’.

In the afore circumstances, this Original Petition is dismissed.

Sd/-