9911796707
TMI Blog1994 (12) TMI 322X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... advance in the agreement). He undertook to have the sale deed registered within six months i.e. on/or before February 23, 1973.Time is, thereby, the essence of the agreement. The appellant had taken possession of the land and levelled the land and applied for permission for sanction of layout. The Gram Panchayat, Bhavani, refused to grant sanction. Thereafter, the appellant got issued a notice on February 20, 1973, calling upon the respondents to return the earnest money of ₹ 50,000/and also ₹ 15,000/said to be the expenditure incurred by them towards development which liability was denied by the respondents in their reply notice wherein they also claimed to have forfeited the earnest money for default committed by the appellant ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... committed grievous error of law in allowing the appeal. We find no force in both contentions. 3. The facts of the case and the conduct of the appellant lead us to conclude that the appellant is not justified in seeking to nor is he entitled to recover from the appellants ₹ 50,000/paid by him. No doubt in the agreement it was stated that the amount was advance and not earnest money. Earnest money is a part of the purchase price. The nomenclature or label given in the agreement as advance is not either decisive or immutable. The appellant, after he had entered into the agreement, admittedly, had taken possession of the land and levelled the land for the purpose of making it into plots for sale to the third parties, in terms of the agr ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... permission from the court under s.8. In this case, admittedly, during the pendency of the suit, the third respondent-minor after becoming the major on July 31, 1975, was duly declared as major and the mother was discharged from guardianship. Thereafter he filed a memo adopting the written statement filed by the defendants 1 and 2, his brothers. In their written statement and also in the reply notice got issued by them, respondents No. 1, 2 and 4 expressly averred and was testified in the evidence of the first defendant that they are "ready and willing to perform their part of the contract". When the minor became major, he had adopted their written statement, it would certainly mean, as rightly pointed out by the High Court, that t ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... the contract, they are entitled to forfeit the entire amount. In this case even otherwise, we find that the respondents had suffered damages firstly for one year they were prevented from enjoying the property and the appellant had cut off 150 fruit bearing coconut trees and sugarcane crop was destroyed for levelling the land apart from cutting down other trees. Pending the appeal, the respondents sought for and were granted permission by the court for sale of the property, Pursuant thereto, they sold the land for which they could not secure even the amount under contract and the loss they suffered would be around ₹ 70,000/-. Under those circumstances, their forfeiting the sum of ₹ 50,000/cannot be said to be unjustified. The a ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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