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Kamal Kishore Sehgal (D) Thr. LRs & Ors. vs. Murti Devi (Dead) Thr. LRs & Ors.

Not available · 2024 INSC 707Decided 19 Sept 2024
Not available
Justice Pankaj Mithal · Justice R. Mahadevan

Background

A plot of land in Delhi was split into a front portion (A) and a back portion (B) and sold to two different buyers on the same day, for the same price. Because portion B had no independent road access, the sale deed for portion A required its buyer to leave a 15-feet-wide "common passage" for the use of both portions, but the sale deed for portion B carried no matching obligation. The buyer of portion A (respondent's predecessor) later sued for an injunction claiming a wider stretch of passage, including parts running through portion B, was also "common." The trial court dismissed the suit, but the first appellate court reversed this, and the High Court upheld that reversal in second appeal.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court held that only the specific passage which the portion-A owner was contractually bound to leave open (for portion B's access to the road) qualified as the "common passage" described in the deeds. The remaining stretch running through portion B could not be treated as common just because it happened to align with that passage: portion B's sale deed imposed no such reciprocal obligation. The first appellate court had erred by reading the phrase "common passage" too broadly and ignoring the deeds' actual wording. The Court set aside the first appellate court's and High Court's decisions and restored the trial court's dismissal of the suit, with no order as to costs.

Lesson Learnt

Rights over a "common" passage or similar shared feature must be determined strictly from what the relevant sale deed actually says. Courts cannot extend such an obligation to bind land whose own deed imposed no such condition, however logical it might seem.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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