IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.19767 of 2009 (O&M) Date of decision:01 .02.2010 Ropan Ghai and another ....Petitioners versus State of Punjab and others ...Respondents CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN Present: Mr.P.K. Gupta, Advocate, for the petitioners. Mr. Anil Kumar Sharma, Additional Advocate General, Punjab. ---- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? 2. To be referred to the reporters or not ? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest ? ---- K.Kannan, J. (Oral) C.M. No.1147 of 2010 C.M. is allowed, as prayed for. Replication is taken on record. Civil Writ Petition No.19767 of 2009 1. On registration of 2 documents of sales, the petitioner was purported to have paid the stamp duty penalty of Rs.2,73,600/- and produced before the Registering Officer a bank remittance for the payment of stamp duty. The contention on behalf of the State was that it transpired that the petitioner had remitted only Rs.73,600/- but had tampered with the official receipts to make it appear as though Rs.2,73,600/- had been remitted to the Bank. Civil Writ Petition No.19767 of 2009 (O&M) - 2 - 2. On an alleged fraud committed by the petitioner, action for recovery of Rs.2 lakhs was made and an attachment was also issued by the impugned proceedings for non-payment of Rs.2 lakhs. The grievance of the petitioner is that the proceedings for recovery and attachment could not be lawfully effected without giving an opportunity to the petitioner to show cause against such recovery. He denies that there had been any fraud committed by him and asserts that the stamp duty payable was actually remitted to the Bank. 3. Having regard to the factual consideration involved in this case and an express dispute raised by the petitioner relating to the remittance purported to have been made with the Bank towards the stamp duty, the impugned proceedings are set aside and the respondent shall serve a notice within a period of 3 weeks from the date of receipt of the copy of this order giving an opportunity to explain the alleged fraud or shortage in the stamp duty paid by the petitioner and take a decision after such notice, within a period of 6 weeks therefrom. Subject to this liberty, the impugned proceedings are quashed. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 01.02.2010 sanjeev