IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.15497 of 2009 Date of Decision: 08.10.2009 Randhir Singh and others Petitioners Versus State of Haryana and others Respondents CORAM:- HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE JASBIR SINGH Present: Mr.Vikram Singh, Advocate for the petitioners ….. Jasbir Singh, J. (Oral) This writ petition has been filed to lay challenge to an order dated 30.11.2006 (P4), vide which, the Collector, by invoking the provisions of Section 47-A of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, directed the petitioners to pay an amount of Rs.2,82,000/- towards deficient payment of stamp duty, at the time of registration of sale deed on 22.7.2003. Further challenge is to an order dated 12.6.2009 (P7), vide which, appeal filed by the petitioners was partly accepted and amount claimed was decreased by 50%. It is apparent from the records that when the sale deed was presented for registration, the Sub-Registrar impounded the same and referred the matter to adjudicate regarding payment of deficient stamp duty, to the Collector. The Collector issued a notice to the respondents and also conducted a thorough enquiry and thereafter, came to a conclusion that the land is not agricultural, as shown in the sale deed, rather it is residential in character. Relevant portion of the order passed reads thus:- Civil Writ Petition No.15497 of 2009 “On 29.11.2006 the land recorded in the sale deed was inspected. On the spot, it was found that this land is situated in the shape of plots of the southern side of Sub Division Complex, where foundation has been filed in some of the plots and on some of the plots kothis are constructed. The land is not under cultivation rather is residential. It has been found on the perusal of the record that this land remained under cultivation upto year 2002 and as per copy of khasra girdwari dated 27.3.2002, wheat crop has been cultivated in this land and after 10.10.2002 upto till date I has been shown as Gair Mumkin. In this way, this land is not under cultivation rather residential. The Collector rate of the residential land here as Rs.500/- per sq. yard in the year 2003-04. Thus the total value of 4840 Sq. yard land comes to Rs.24,20,000/- on which total stamp duty at the rate of Rs.15.5% comes to Rs.3,75,100/-. The respondents have already deposited the stamp duty of Rs.93,000/-. Now stamp duty of Rs.375100-93000 i.e. Rs.2,82,000/- is payable towards the respondents, recovery of which be made from the respondents and the original sale deed be returned to the respondents.” Petitioners went in appeal, which was partly allowed by the Commissioner, by noting that the code, to asses value for residential property, has wrongly been applied by the Collector. This Court feels that orders passed are perfectly justified. Before ordering recovery of the amount, the Collector has conducted a thorough enquiry, spot inspection was done, all the revenue documents were looked into and only thereafter, order was passed. No case is made out for interference. 2 Civil Writ Petition No.15497 of 2009 Dismissed. 08.10.2009 (Jasbir Singh) gk Judge 3