TRUST FOR EDUCATION AND REHABILITATION OF DISABLED ORPHANS AND DESTITUTES Vs. INSPECTOR GENERAL OF REGISTRATION CHENNAI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) A charitable organisation providing food and shelter and rehabilitating the disabled, orphans and destitutes has approached this Court for an order to get the sale deed released and to direct the first respondent to hold an enquiry into the misconduct of the fourth respondent and to take appropriate proceedings in the accordance with law including to award compensation to the petitioner for the inordinate delay in releasing the document.

(2.) THE petitioner is a charitable trust with the objects, inter alia, to educate and rehabilitate the disabled, orphans and destitutes who are lying uncared for on the roadsides in the city of Chennai and its suburbs, to give them food and shelter and to treat them in the nearby hospitals and also to rehabilitate them. THE petitioner Trust has been recognized by the Directorate of Rehabilitation of the Disabled, Government of Tamil Nadu and they have been given the benefit under Sec.80-G of the Income Tax Act. According to the petitioner, the Trust is running a Home called "Anbagaam" at No.11, Perianna Mudali Street, Chennai-1. As the said accommodation was inadequate with the number of inmates increasing day-by-day, the petitioner Trust, with the benevolvent contribution from the public, acquired a land of an extent of 1.61 acres in S.Nos.377/1, 378, 380 and 381/2 of No.147, Thirunilai Village, Ponneri Taluk, Thirvallur District for constructing a permanent Home with suitable amenities. THE said property was purchased for a consideration of Rs.80,600 and the sale deed in respect thereof was presented for registration before the third respondent on 23.4.2001, who took the document as pending Document No.229 of 2001 after receiving a sum of Rs.910 towards registration fee etc. According to the petitioner, it was represented at that time by the third respondent that the document could be released after side inspection by their officials within about ten days time. However, after repeated requests on several occasions and in view of the urgency and dire need to shift the inmates after construction of a building, the land was inspected on 30.5.2001. Even thereafter the request of the petitioner to release the document to take necessary follow-up to. While similar sales executed in the same village were released on the same day or immediately thereafter, the third respondent, for obvious consideration, was withholding the document presented by the petitioner. THE petitioner came to understand that the third respondent has purposely sent an incorrect report to the second respondent in reference to the market value of the land so as to withhold the document. Ultimately, the petitioner's counsel was constrained to issue a lawyer's notice, bringing to the notice of the third respondent the judgment of the Division Bench of this Court, directing the release of the document for reference within three weeks from the date of presentation of the document. THE petitioner was therefore left with no other alternative but to move this Court for the above direction.

(3.) SEC.3 of the Indian Stamps Act, 1899 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) is a charging SECtion, which reads as follows: " 3.Instruments chargeable with duty: Subject to the provisions of this Act and the exemptions contained in Schedule I, the following instruments shall be chargeable with duty of the amount indicated in that Schedule as the proper duty therefor respectively." SEC.10 indicates as to how the stamp duty should be paid. The relevant portion reads as follows: " 10.Duties how to be paid: (1) Except as otherwise expressly provided in this Act, all duties with which any instruments are chargeable shall be paid, and such payment shall be indicated on such instruments, by means of stamps". SEC.27 of the Act mandates that the consideration of the market value and all other facts and circumstances affecting the chargeability of any instrument with duty shall be fully and truly set forth therein. SEC.35 says that no instrument chargeable with duty shall be admitted in evidence or acted upon registered or authenticated unless such instrument is duly stamped. SEC.47-A of the Act sets out the procedure to be followed with reference to the under-valued documents. The Tamil Nadu Stamp (Prevention of Undervaluation of Instruments) Rules, 1968 has been framed under SEC.47-A of the Central Act. Rule 3 enables the registering officer, for the purpose of finding out whether the market value has been correctly furnished in the instrument, to make such enquiries as he may deem fit. He may elicit from the parties concerned any information having a bearing on the subject and call for and examine any records kept with any public officer or authority. Sub-rule (4) stated as follows: "(4) The registering officer may also look into the" Guidelines Register "containing the value of properties supplied to them for the purpose of verifying the market value". Explanation: The "Guidelines Register" supplied to the officers is intended merely to assist them to ascertain prima facie, whether the market value has been truly set forth, in the instruments. The entries made therein regarding the value of properties cannot be a substitute for market price. Such entries will not foreclose the enquiry of the Collector under SEC.47-A of the Act or fetter the discretion of the authorities concerned to satisfy themselves on the reasonableness or otherwise of the value expressed in the documents."