IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.6062 of 1997 (O&M) Date of decision:07.07.2011 M/s Seema Agro Industries, Village Wazirpur, Tehsil and District Gurgaon, through its partner Shri Sanjay Walia son of Shri Amar Singh. ...Petitioner versus The State of Haryana, through the Secretary, Government Haryana, Department of Finance, Civil Secretariat, Chandigarh and others. ....Respondents CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN ---- Present: Mr. D.S.Bali, Senior Advocate, with Ms. Neha Maan, Advocate, for the petitioner. Ms.Kirti Singh, Deputy Advocate General, Haryana. Mr. Rajesh Hooda, Advocate, for Mr. Kamal Sehgal, Advocate, and Mr. Ragat Pangeta, Advocate, for Mr. R.S.Chahar, Advocate, for respondents 2 and 3. ---- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? No. 2. To be referred to the reporters or not ? No. 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest ? No. ---- K.Kannan, J. (Oral) 1. The writ petition contains a prayer for quashing the auction notice and the rejection of the bid for sale of the property of the petitioner purported to have been concluded for Rs.5.05 lacs on the bid alleged to have been given by S.S.Yadav through his power of attorney Raj Singh. The proposal for auction of the petitioner's property came to be taken by the Haryana Financial Corporation, the 2nd respondent Civil Writ Petition No.6062 of 1997 (O&M) - 2 - herein, for amounts that were due to it for the loan advanced to the petitioner. 2. The petitioner's grievance was that he had brought buyers for purchase of the property, namely, one Naresh Kumar for a price of Rs.4.86 lacs initially. He was called for a negotiation when the bids were opened to find that S.S.Yadav through a power of attorney had made a bid for Rs.4.95 lacs and he was not prepared to increase the bid. Under such circumstance, the bid of Naresh Kumar was termed the highest and it was decided to accept the same. It was, however, claimed by the 2nd respondent that on 30.07.1996, the power of attorney Raj Singh for Yadav had made an impersonation as though Naresh Kumar was present but he was a fictitious person and the offer of Rs.5 lacs was not genuine. His complaint was that a fraud had been practised and there was neither the address of Naresh Kumar nor any communication address had been given to confirm that he was a genuine buyer. It was, under such circumstance, the respondents claimed that they decided to re-tender the unit, when Raj Singh was reported to have offered a highest amount of Rs.5.05 lacs. The petition is filed by the petitioner aggrieved by the acceptance of the offer of Yadav through Raj Singh, contending that there was never at any point of time a higher offer of Rs.5.05 lacs and the 2nd respondent had himself colluded with Yadav through power of attorney to defeat the higher offer of Rs.5 lacs and denied to the petitioner the best of the bargain on that date. 3. I would have accepted all these contentions to be bonafide and genuine if the petitioner was interested in securing a protection to Civil Writ Petition No.6062 of 1997 (O&M) - 3 - himself on the ground that his property fetched the best price and he was not put to any loss by having to suffer the sale of the property in favour of a person, who bid less than the amount which yet another person was reported to have bid. This would have also meant that the action of the 2nd respondent in rejecting a higher offer was not justified. Significantly, in this case, the respondent has gone on record stating that the higher offer of Rs.5.05 lacs was indeed accounted for and the petitioner had been also given a credit for the same. It is also pointed out that Naresh Kumar himself is not a party before the Court challenging the acceptance of an offer of Raj Singh as a power of attorney for Yadav to contend that his offer at Rs.5 lacs alone must have been accepted and what was confirmed after negotiations on 24.07.1996 could not have been reopened to accommodate a claim of Raj Singh as a power of attorney for Yadav. If Naresh Kumar is not before Court to challenge the same and what was ultimately happening was an acceptance of a bid for Rs.5.05 lacs for which the credit was also made, the petitioner cannot be heard to contend that the auction was bad. I have not been shown through any particular violation that could prejudice the petitioner. If the contention was that Rs.5 lacs bid must have been accepted, the Corporation was denying a benefit to the petitioner by accepting a bid of Raj Kumar which was higher than Rs.5 lacs. The writ petition filed even without making either Raj Kumar or Naresh Kumar as parties would show that the petitioner was only interested in stalling the sale proceedings and securing to himself a situation of retaining the property through the interim order secured from this Court. I do not find that the Civil Writ Petition No.6062 of 1997 (O&M) - 4 - petitioner was bona fide in filing the writ petition and I see this to be ploy to defeat and delay the creditor. The auction which was held cannot be stalled at the instance of the petitioner who has had only a personal axe to grind by filing the writ petition. 4. The writ petition is dismissed and the interim order passed already shall stand vacated consequently. (K. KANNAN) JUDGE 07.07.2011 sanjeev