With Mortgage Unredeemed, P&H HC Lets Buyer Add Claim To Enforce 5-Acre Deal Or Recover ₹60 Lakh; Limitation Open

Haswinder Singh, the plaintiff, sued for permanent and mandatory injunction concerning property covered by an agreement to sell dated 24 November 2017.

While the suit was at the plaintiff’s evidence stage, he sought to amend the plaint to add a claim for specific performance or, alternatively, recovery of ₹60,00,000 with interest.

He alleged that the defendant’s obligation to redeem a mortgage had not been fulfilled and that the mortgage had been created to frustrate the agreement.

The defendants opposed the amendment, arguing, among other things, that the specific-performance claim was time-barred and would change the nature of the suit.

The Civil Judge allowed the amendment. Defendant No. 1 challenged that order under Article 227 of the Constitution.

Order VI Rule 17 CPC permits amendments necessary to determine the real questions in controversy, provided they do not cause injustice that cannot be addressed by costs or procedural safeguards; introducing an additional relief or changing the nature of the suit is relevant but not, by itself, an absolute bar.

Article 54 of the Limitation Act prescribes three years for a suit for specific performance, running from the date fixed for performance or, where no date is fixed, from when the plaintiff has notice that performance is refused.

In T.L. Muddu Krishana v. Smt. Lalitha Ramchandra Rao, 1997 (2) RCR (Civil) 154, the Supreme Court held that, where a date for performance is fixed, limitation runs from that date and an out-of-time specific-performance claim could not be introduced by amendment in the circumstances of that case.

Under Article 227, interference was warranted only if the impugned order disclosed jurisdictional error, material irregularity or perversity.

The agreement did not specify a fixed calendar date for execution and registration of the sale deed; performance was contingent on redemption of the mortgage, which remained outstanding.

The Court therefore held that when the plaintiff had notice of refusal—and when limitation began under the second limb of Article 54—required consideration of the agreement’s terms and the pleadings.

The denial of the agreement in the written statement was relevant, but its legal effect could not be conclusively determined at the amendment stage, particularly in light of the unfulfilled mortgage condition.

Allowing the amendment did not decide that the claim was within limitation or that the plaintiff was entitled to specific performance; the defendant remained free to raise limitation and other permissible objections for determination at trial.

The trial court’s order disclosed no ground for revision under Article 227.

It left open the merits of the specific-performance claim and the limitation issue for determination by the trial court, uninfluenced by the High Court’s observations.

Pending applications, if any, were also disposed of.