Supreme Court of India.
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New Delhi: Sixty years after non-delivery of allotted plot and payment of booking and other amounts, the Supreme Court has directed M/s Greater Ashoka and Land Development Company to pay Rs 50 lakh as full and final settlement to the legal representatives of a man.
The man could not get a plot booked at the rate of Rs 25 sq yard in a plan approved in 1961 for a colony in Faridabad.
"Merely refunding the earnest money paid after sixty years will be unreasonable as the respondent, Kanti Prasad Jain (deceased) through his legal representatives after booking the plot, has been waiting all along as even in the litigation since 1986. The price of the land in the area has increased manifold in the last 60 years," a bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Rajesh Bindal said in a recent order.
The court found that allotment of the plot was made way back on November 19, 1963.
However, subsequently, the cost of the plot was raised to the rate of Rs 135 per square yard as against Rs 25 per square yard at which the initial allotment was made. But when the allottee sought details, no information was provided.
The appellant said that at present, all the plots have been sold out and it was ready to compensate.
The court, however, said, "The argument of the appellant (company) that the respondent had requested for refund of the earnest money paid by him vide letters dated 27.01.1975 and 1.01.1976 also deserves to be rejected as it was not responded to by the appellant."
However, the bench modified the Punjab and Haryana High Court's order which had restored the trial court's decree for specific performance of the contract. The HC had set aside the appellate court's order that had reversed the direction for execution of the sale deed.
"Considering the totality of the facts, in our view, the interest of justice will meet in case the impugned judgment and decree of the High Court is modified to the extent that instead of getting the sale deed of the plot registered at the rate of Rs 25 per square yard, in the alternative, the appellant pays a total amount of Rs 50,00,000 to the respondent as full and final settlement of the claim in the suit. The amount is to be paid within a period of three months," the bench said.