RADHA KAMAL Vs. PURI MUNICIPALITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a second appeal by the unsuccessful plaintiff who has lost his suit for specific performance in both the Courts below.

(2.) The facts leading up to this litigation are briefly these. On 10-7-23 defendant No. 1, namely, the Municipality of Puri, granted a lease of 500 acres of land on the Beach Road to one Chandramoni Devi, the period for which the lease was to run being stipulated as twenty years. The lessee-assigned her leasehold interest by four different sale-deeds, to four different persons including the plaintiff, and his brother, Dr. Radha Kumud Mukherjee. Under these assignments the plaintiff and his brother, each acquired 120 acres of the entire lease-hold by virtue of two sale- deeds dated 26-5-1925. The other vendees from Chandramoni Devi were one Promode Sundari and one Amiya Nath Mukherjee. By an identure made on the 10th January 1944, defendant No. 1 granted a lease of the plot purchased by the plaintiff from Chandramoni Devi, to defendant No. 2, and by a subsequent sale-deed dated 9-6-1944 the second defendant conveyed the very same property to defendant No. 3. The case for the plaintiff is that he is entitled to a renewal of the lease granted to Chandramoni Devi his vendor in respect of the plot purchased by him from her and on the same terms and conditions as were contained in the original lease. The main contest put forward on behalf of the municipality is that there was a breach of one of the terms of the lease by the plaintiff and that, accordingly, he was not entitled to exercise the option of having the lease renewed as provided for therein. The municipality therefore contends that it was entitled to regard the original lease as having been cancelled and grant the plot in question to defendant No. '2. The plea of defendant No. 3 is that she was a bona fide purchaser of the plot for value without notice of the prior contract in favour of the plaintiff by the Municipality, and that therefore the plaintiff should not be allowed specific performance of the lease as against her.

(3.) Some of the terms of the lease granted to Chandramoni Devi which have a bearing on the decision of the dispute between the parties are given below: