VINODCHANDRA SHANTILAL SHAH Vs. CHIEF CONTROLLING REVENUE AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) .These 12 Special Civil Applications involve common questions of law based on identical facts, and therefore, I propose to decide all these 12 Special Civil Applications by this common judgment and order as under :

(2.) Certain plots had been put to public auction by Disa Nagar Palika in the year 1992. The public auction was held and the upset price in respect of these plots as was determined by the Deputy Town Planner was declared. The public auction was held on 29th August, 1992. In this public auction, the petitioners herein purchased different plots at different prices as per the bids given by them and accordingly the sale deeds were required to be registered before the Sub-Registrar. The petitioners herein paid the stamp duty at the upset price which was fixed and did not pay the stamp duty at the actual price which was fetched by the Municipality. The concerned Sub-Registrar had registered the sale deeds and for such registration, the petitioners paid the stamp duty at the upset price at which the plots in question were put to public auction. The Deputy Collector, Stamp Duty Valuation Organisation, Banaskantha, at Palanpur, therefore, issued notices under Sec. 32(A)(4) of the Bombay Stamp Act, 1958 read with Rule 4(2) of the relevant Rules as to why the stamp duty may not be charged at the market value along with penalty. After such notices and after hearing the petitioners, the Deputy Collector, passed the order on 2nd May, 1992 directing the petitioners to pay the difference in the stamp duty as mentioned in Schedule-1 and Schedule-11 against their names in this order as he found that in each of these cases, the actual amount which was paid to the Municipality as per the respective bid was higher than the amount at which the document was sought to be registered as per column Nos. 4 and 5 of this Schedule and the difference was also determined and the same was also mentioned in column No. 6 as contained in Schedule-1 and II. It has also been recorded by the Deputy Collector in this order dated 2nd May, 1999 that six persons named in Schedule- 1 had appeared and agreed to pay the difference and had stated that some concessions may be made in their favour with regard to the amount of penalty inasmuch as their intention was not to put any loss of revenue to the Government but they had acted on the basis of the information as was given to them by the Municipality and the order which had been passed by the Collector, Banaskantha, on 23rd November. 1992. Schedule-11 of this order, includes the names of those persons upon whom the notices had been served but who did not appear in response to the notice and did not raise any grievance. The petitioners have not given the correct and complete details, and therefore, the same be read from the statements at Appendix-'A' and Appendix-'B' with this judgment which are to be treated as part and parcel of this judgment. <FRM>JUDGEMENT_1807_GLR2_2001Html1.htm</FRM> <FRM>JUDGEMENT_1807_GLR2_2001Html2.htm</FRM> It appears that the order as was passed by the Deputy Collector on 2nd May, 1996 was taken in appeal before the Chief Controlling Revenue Authority, who rejected the appeals on 22nd June, 1998. These orders are under challenge at the instance of the petitioners.

(3.) The main contention which has been raised on behalf of the petitioners is that the Collector at Banaskantha, in his order dated 23rd November, 1992, i.e. Annexure-E at page Nos. 28-31 in Special Civil Application No. 8036 of 1999, while mentioning the conditions, had clearly mentioned in condition No. 2 that the stamp duty was to be paid at the upset price as was fixed by the Deputy Town Planner, and therefore, there is no question of payment of any stamp duty for the actual amount which was fetched by the Municipality in this auction and the stamp duty was therefore paid at the upset price. In this regard, the attention of this Court was invited by Mr. Bhagat to a subsequent corrigendum dated 22nd December, 1992 issued by the Collector himself. A copy of this corrigendum has been filed along with the affidavit-in-reply and it appears from this corrigendum that it was issued because the Chief Executive Officer of the Municipality had sent a letter to the Collector for removing the conditions Nos. 3 and 4 as were contained in the Collector's order dated 23rd November, 1992. The Collector, on the basis of the Chief Executive Officer's letter, deleted the conditions Nos. 3 and 4 vide this corrigendum dated 22nd December, 1999, but also mentioned in this corrigendum that the documentation was to be done on the basis of the price which was actually fetched at the time of auction. Therefore, in the proceedings in this petition before this Court on 29th February 2000, it was rightly observed by the Court (Coram: R. K. Abichandani, J.) that prima facie, it did not appear that the condition No. 2 as such had been witHdrawn vide the corrigendum dated 22nd December, 1992. However, it is made clear that in substance, once it was mentioned in the corrigendum that the documentation was to be done on the basis of the actual price which was fetched in the auction by the Municipality, the condition No. 2 substantially stood revoked.