HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE LAXMI NARAYANA ALISHETTY CIVIL REVISION PETITION No.603 of 2024

ORDER

This Civil Revision Petition, under Article 227 of the Constitution of India, is filed against the order dated 22.11.2023 in I.A.No.626 of 2018 in O.S.No.1509 of 2017, passed by the VI Additional District Judge, Ranga Reddy District at Kukatpally (hereinafter referred to as the ‘District Court’).

2. Heard Smt Kalpana Ekbote, learned counsel for the petitioner, Sri M.V. Pratap Kumar, learned counsel for respondent No.1, and Sri Ashish Samat, learned counsel for respondent No.2.

3. The brief facts of the case as narrated in the present Civil Revision Petition are that:

3.1 Respondent No.2 offered to sell the residential Plot in Sy.Nos.175 to 182, admeasuring 300 square yards, at Cyber Meadows Society, Kondapur Village, Serilingampally Mandal, Ranga Reddy District, (hereinafter referred to as the ‘scheduled property’) to respondent No.1; that respondent No.1 after being satisfied with the title of respondent No.2 agreed to purchase the said Plot; that accordingly, respondent No.2 executed into an agreement of sale dated 12.03.2009 in favour of respondent No.1, wherein respondent No.2 acknowledged receipt of Rs.70,00,000/‑ (Rupees Seventy lakhs only) from respondent No.1; that owing to misplacement of documents and other reasons cited by respondent No. 2, the sale deed was not executed, nonetheless, possession was delivered to respondent No. 1, who has since been in possession and has been paying maintenance and telephone charges.

3.2 While so, in the first week of November, 2017, respondent No. 1 discovered that respondent No. 2 had, in 2010, subsequent to the agreement of sale, created a mortgage over the scheduled property in favour of the petitioner‑bank and deposited the original sale deed as security to the loan availed by him.

3.3 Consequently, respondent No.1 filed OS.No.1509 of 2017 seeking the relief of specific performance of agreement of sale by directing respondent No.2 to execute a registered sale deed in favour of respondent No.1; and for mandatory injunction directing the petitioner herein to deliver the original sale deed dated

11.10.2006 and the rectification deed dated 27.11.2006; and also for permanent injunction restraining the petitioner and respondent No.2 from interfering with his possession of the scheduled property.

3.4 During the pendency of said suit, the petitioner-bank filed I.A.No. 626 of 2018 under Order VII Rule 11 CPC, stating that the averments in the plaint to be baseless. It was further averred that respondent No.2 being the absolute and sole owner of the scheduled property, approached the petitioner- bank, availed loan and created charge over the schedule property as security to the loan; that thereafter, as the said loan account has become NPA, the petitioner-bank has initiated measures under the Securitisation and Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Security Interest Act, 2002 (for brevity ‘the SARFAESI Act’); and respondent No.2 has filed SA.No.774 of 2013 before Debts Recovery Tribunal, Hyderabad (hereinafter referred to as ‘DRT’), however, the same was dismissed. Aggrieved by the same, Writ Petition No.11983 of 2015 was preferred by respondent No.2 and the said Writ Petition was disposed of by directing respondent No.2 to deposit a sum of Rupees One Crore within a stipulated period, and on failure of respondent No.2 to deposit the same, the petitioner-bank was allowed to proceed in accordance with the law. By stating thus, the petitioner-bank prayed for rejection of the plaint on the ground that the present case comes under the jurisdiction of DRT, and the civil court has no jurisdiction to entertain the same.

4. The District Court, on considering the pleadings and contentions advanced on behalf of both the parties, dismissed the said application by the impugned order on the ground that as the suit was filed for specific performance of an agreement of sale, Section 34 of the SARFAESI Act