Elder Brother’s GIDC Plot Claim Fails After He Witnessed Mother’s Transfer To Younger Son; Gujarat HC Upholds Dismissal

The plaintiff and defendant No. 1 are brothers.

Their mother, Hiraben, held rights in a GIDC residential plot on which two residential properties had been constructed.

The plaintiff occupied one property and defendant No. 1 the other.

The plaintiff disputed the transfer of the plot to defendant No. 1, alleging that he had not waived any rights and had only consented to a bank loan; he sought declaratory and injunctive relief

The Trial Court dismissed the suit, finding that Hiraben transferred the plot to defendant No. 1 during her lifetime and that the plaintiff had failed to establish a right in the plot.

The first appellate court affirmed that decision, relying, among other things, on transfer documents bearing the plaintiff’s signature as a witness and GIDC’s transfer order.

The plaintiff appealed under Section 100 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (CPC)

Section 100 CPC confines a second appeal to cases involving a substantial question of law; the High Court does not ordinarily reappreciate evidence or disturb concurrent findings of fact.

Interference may be warranted where findings are contrary to mandatory law or settled legal principles, rest on inadmissible evidence or no evidence, or are vitiated by perversity.

The Court relied on Jaichand (Dead) through LRs v. Sahnulal, 2024 SCC OnLine SC 3864, including its reliance on Kondiba Dagadu Kadam v. Savitribai Sopan Gujar, AIR 1999 SC 2213

and on Russi Fisheries (P) Ltd. v. Bhavna Seth, 2026 SCC OnLine SC 555

The High Court found that the plaintiff had produced no material establishing a right, title, or interest in the plot.

The courts below had found that Hiraben transferred the plot to defendant No. 1 during her lifetime, GIDC approved the transfer, and the plaintiff had not challenged the transaction until 2016 despite signing relevant documents as a witness

In those circumstances, the Court held that the plaintiff could not establish a basis for challenging the finding that defendant No. 1 had acquired the plot, and found no perversity or gross legal error in the concurrent findings

It further observed that any claim concerning GIDC’s underlying title would be for GIDC to raise; GIDC had not appealed

No order as to costs was made.

The connected civil application for stay was disposed of as no longer surviving