Karnataka HC Rejects 4-Acre Title Suit As Time-Barred, Finding Plaintiffs Knew Of Rival Sale Deed By 2000

The plaintiffs sued for a declaration of ownership and possession over 4 acres 28 guntas, relying on a registered gift deed dated 6 June 1960, and sought a declaration that a sale deed dated 11 November 1964 in favour of the defendants’ father was null and void and not binding on them.

After the defendants’ names were entered in the revenue records in 1997–98, the plaintiffs challenged the entries in revenue proceedings; the judgment records that the disputed sale deed and the competing title claim were known during those proceedings.

The plaintiffs filed the present suit in 2023, alleging a fresh cause of action when the defendants brought prospective purchasers to the property in January 2023.

The defendants sought rejection of the plaint under Order VII Rule 11 CPC as time-barred. The trial court dismissed that application on 23 April 2024, and the defendants challenged that order in this revision petition.

Order VII Rule 11(d) CPC permits rejection of a plaint where, on its own averments and the documents relied on by the plaintiff, the suit appears barred by law; the plaint must be read as a whole.

Article 58 of the Limitation Act, 1963 prescribes three years for a suit seeking a declaration, running from when the right to sue first accrues.

Article 59 prescribes three years for cancellation or setting aside an instrument, running from when the facts entitling the plaintiff to that relief first become known.

The judgment also refers to Khatri Hotels Pvt. Ltd. v. Union of India, (2011) 9 SCC 126, cited by the petitioners on the accrual of the right to sue, and to Kum. Geetha v. Nanjundaswamy, 2023 INSC 964, which the trial court had referred to.

The Court treated the earlier revenue proceedings as material because the plaintiffs’ challenge to the defendants’ mutation entries showed that the adverse claim to the property had already been asserted and was known to them.

It held that the revenue authorities’ observation that title should be resolved by a civil court did not postpone or extend limitation, and that the later writ proceedings did not, without a statutory basis, suspend or renew it.

The Court therefore considered the right to seek declaratory relief to have accrued by 1997–2000, when the competing title claim and disputed sale deed were known, rather than in 2023 when the plaintiffs alleged a further threat to the property.

The alleged later dispossession could support a claim for possession, but did not reset limitation for the declaration concerning the already-known adverse claim and instrument.

It set aside the trial court’s order dated 23 April 2024, allowed the defendants’ application under Order VII Rule 11 CPC, and rejected the plaint as barred by limitation.

The Civil Revision Petition was allowed.