AKSHAY & ANR. versus ADITYA & ORS.
[2024] 8 S.C.R. 847, Supreme Court of India, 2024
Outcome: Dismissed (Dismissed)
Segment: Issues
[2024] 8 S.C.R. 847 : 2024 INSC 657
Akshay & Anr. 
v. 
Aditya & Ors.
(Civil Appeal Nos. 3642-3646 of 2018)
29 August 2024
[Bela M. Trivedi and Satish Chandra Sharma, JJ.]
Issue for Consideration
Appellants-landowners executed a Joint Venture Agreement and 
an irrevocable power of attorney in favour of the Respondent 
No.2-builder for the development of the land and construction 
of flats. Respondent No.2 entered into sale agreements with the 
complainants-respondents for the units in question. Complaints 
filed by the respondents against the appellants and Respondent 
No.2 inter alia for declaration that they were guilty of deficiency 
in service and were jointly and severally liable to complete the 
construction as per the terms and conditions agreed between the 
parties and put the complainants in possession of the properties 
after completing the construction as also to execute the registered 
sale deeds in respect thereof. Complaints allowed by the State 
Commission. Order upheld by NCDRC. Whether the appellants 
were bound by the acts of the Respondent No.2 carried out pursuant 
to the irrevocable Power of Attorney till it was terminated.
Headnotes†
Consumer Dispute – Deficiency in service – Non-compliance 
of the terms and conditions of Joint Venture Agreement  
(JVA) by Respondent No.2-builder – Appellants-landowners 
and the Respondent No.2-builder, if were jointly and severally 
liable as held by State Commission and upheld by NCDRC:
Held: Yes – Though allegedly the
power of attorney was revoked 
by the appellants by the letter of revocation, the JVA was not 
revoked and it continued to be in force – In the revocation letter, 
the appellants had stated to be not liable “Henceforth”, i.e after 
the said letter was sent – Thus, the appellants were bound by the 
acts/deeds of the Respondent No.2 carried out pursuant to the 
irrevocable Power of Attorney till it was terminated, in accordance 
with law – Appellants liable for the acts of Respondent No.2 – 
Judgment of NCDRC not interfered with. [Paras 8, 9]
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List of Acts
Consumer Protection Act, 1986.
List of Keywords
Consumer Dispute; Joint Venture Agreement; Power of attorney; 
Irrevocable power of attorney; Landowners; Development of 
the land; Construction of flats; Deficiency in service; Jointly and 
severally liable; Power of attorney revoked; Revocation letter; 
“Henceforth”.
Case Arising From
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Civil Appeal Nos. 3642-3646 
of 2018
From the Judgment and Order dated 28.11.2017 of the National 
Consumers Disputes Redressal Commission, New Delhi in FA Nos. 
1664-1668 of 2017
Appearances for Parties
Kailash Vasdev, Sr. Adv., R. Mohan, V. Balaji, Asaithambi MSM, B. 
Dhananjay, S. Devendran, Limrao Singh Rawat, Rakesh K. Sharma, 
Advs. for the Appellants.
Siddhartha Dave, Sr. Adv., Piyush Singhal, Bijnender Singh, Praveen 
Swarup, Alekhya Shastry, Ms. Arundati Mukherjee, Ms. Amita Singh 
Kalkal, Abhinav Ramkrishna, Advs. for the Respondents.
Judgment / Order of the Supreme Court
Judgment
1.	
This set of five Appeals arises out of the common Judgment 
and Order dated 28-11-2017 passed by the National Consumer 
Disputes Redressal Commission, New Delhi (here-in-after, referred 
to as “NCDRC”) in First Appeal Nos.1664-1668 of 2017, whereby 
the NCDRC has dismissed the said Appeals filed by the present 
appellants challenging the Judgment and Order dated 10-7-2017 
passed by the Maharashtra State Consumer Disputes Redressal 
Commission, Circuit Bench,
Nagpur (here-in-after, referred to as 
“State Commission”) in a Consumer Complaint No. 85 of 2015.
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Akshay & Anr. v. Aditya & Ors.
2.	
The appellants – herein are the owners of the land in question. They 
entered into a Joint Venture Agreement with Respondent No.2 – 
Glandstone Mahaveer Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd. for the development of 
the land and for construction of flats as mentioned herein. It appears 
that the appellants also executed Irrevocable Power of Attorney dated 
6-7-2013 in favour of Respondent No.2 with regard to the said land. 
The Respondent No.2 on the basis of the said documents, entered 
into the sale agreements with the respondents – complainants for 
the units in question.
3.	
The respondents – complainants filed the complaints before the ‘State 
Commission’ under Section 17 of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 
against the present appellants and Respondent No.2 seeking inter 
alia the declaration that the present appellants and the Respondent 
No.2 were jointly and severally involved in the unfair trade practices 
and were guilty of deficiency in service, that they were jointly and 
severally liable to complete the activities and construction as per the 
terms and conditions agreed upon between the parties and put the 
complainants in possession of the properties mentioned in Schedule 
‘D’ after completing the construction as also to execute the registered 
sale deeds in respect thereof.
4.	
The ‘State Commission’ after considering the pleadings of the parties 
allowed the said complaints. The ‘State Commission’ holding opponent
Nos.1 to 3 (the present appellants and Respondent No.2) liable 
for the completion of the construction of dwelling units as per the 
agreement with the complainants and passed the following order:-
“i.	
The complaints as referred Nos. CC/15/85, CC/15/86, 
CC/15/99, CC/15/100 & CC/15/111 are partly allowed.
ii.	
The OP Nos. 1,2&3 to provide the possession of the 
dwelling unit agreed in Agreement to Sell (SA) with 
each complainant in the span of six months from 
the date of the receipt of copy of this order and the 
complainants to pay the entire consideration of the 
dwelling unit as per the stages and the final amount 
at the time of sale deed and possession as per the 
agreement.
iii.	
The OP Nos. 1,2,&3 after completion of construction 
of dwelling units as per agreement to sell & on
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receiving full consideration as per agreement as 
above, shall execute sale deed of respective dwelling 
units as per agreement to respective complainant. 
The complainants shall bear expenses for execution 
and registration of sale deeds.
iv.	
The O.P. Nos.2&3 to cooperate with O.P. No.1 in the 
compliance of trhe agreement signed by the O.P. 
No.1 with the complainants as per the conditions of 
the Joint Venture Agreement (JVA) and (Irrevocable 
Power of Attorney (IPA).
v.	
The O.P. No.1 to provide the compensation of 
Rs.1,00,000/- to each of complainant for physical 
and mental harassment in the span of one month 
from the date of receipt of copy of this order and on 
failure, to pay interest at the rate of 9% p.a. upon it, 
till the final payment.
vi.	
The O.P.No.1 to provide the cost of Rs.10,000/- to 
each of the complainant in the span of 30 days from 
the date of the receipt of copy of this order & on 
failure to pay interest upon it at the rate of 9% p.a., 
till final payment.
vii.	 No order against O.P.No.4
viii.	 Copy of the order be provided to both the parties, 
free of cost.”
5.	
Being aggrieved by the said order, the present appellants, preferred 
the First Appeals before the `NCDRC’, which came to be dismissed 
by the `NCDRC’ vide the impugned common order holding as under:-
“8. The State Commission have brought out in their order 
that the Joint-Venture Agreement (JVA) and the Irrevocable 
Power of Attorney
(IPA) were prepared on 06.07.2013. As 
per condition No.15 of the said agreement, the builder had 
been given the authority to sell the constructed Units on 
the property. The IPA also authorised the OP-1 builder to 
execute the registered sale deeds etc. and receive the 
consideration. The State Commission, further, observed 
that the present appellants/OP-2 and 3 had issued notice,
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Akshay & Anr. v. Aditya & Ors.
by which they claimed that they had cancelled the JVA 
and the IPA. However, the said notice was issued on 
12.08.2014, which was much after the agreement made 
by the OP-1 with the complainants. The State Commission 
concluded that at the time of the agreement between the 
builder and the complainants, the JVA and IPA were very 
much operative. It is evident, therefore, that the appellants 
cannot wash their hands off from the matter, as it would 
result in grave injustice to the complainants consumers.
9. At the time of hearing also in these appeals, the learned 
counsel for the appellants was asked that in case the plea 
taken by them in the appeals were accepted, how shall 
it be possible to safeguard the interests of the consumer, 
who had invested in the said project, after looking at the 
agreement between them and the OP-1 builder. However, 
no satisfactory reply could be given by the appellants on 
that score. It is made out, therefore, that the interests of 
the complainants/ consumers shall be heavily jeopardised, 
if the plea of the appellants/OP-2 and 3 is accepted.
10. The appellants have referred to the orders made by the 
Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case, Faqir Chand Gulati 
vs. Uppal Agencies Pvt. Ltd. & Anr., (2008) 10 SCC 345 
and in the case, Sunga Daniel Babu vs. Sri Vasudeva 
Constructions & Ors., (2016) 8 SCC 429, in support of 
their arguments before the State Commission as well as 
this
Commission. I, however, agree with the contention of 
the State Commission that these two judgments are not 
applicable in the present cases. In the said judgments, it 
was concluded that a landowner, who was supposed to 
be provided a portion of the devloped property after the 
development made by the builder, was a consumer vis-a-
vis the builder. The issue in the present case is, however, 
different, as the present complaints have been filed by 
the complainants against the builder as well as the land 
owners/appellants. The orders made by the Hon’ble Apex 
Court are, therefore not applicable in the present cases.
11. From the discussion above, it is held that the appellants/
OP-2 and 3 landowners cannot be allowed to escape their
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responsibility/role in the matter of providing relief to the 
complainants/consumers in terms of the impugned order 
passed by the State Commission. It is held, therefore, that 
the impugned order does not suffer from any illegality, 
irregularity or jurisdictional error of any kind and the 
same is upheld. The present appeals are ordered to be 
dismissed in limine.”
6.	
It is vehemently submitted by the learned Senior counsel – Mr. 
Kailash Vasdev that the appellants had already revoked the Power 
of Attorney executed by them in favour of Respondent No.2, by the 
letter of revocation dated 12-8-2014, coupled with Public Notice of 
the same date and hence the appellants could not be held liable 
for any act done by Respondent No.2, who had allegedly entered 
into agreements with the complainants. He also submitted that 
the Complaints as such are not maintainable under the Consumer 
Protection Act against the appellants, who were not privy to the 
agreement between the Respondent No.2 and the complainants. 
However, the learned Senior counsel – Mr. Siddhartha Dave for the 
Respondent No.2 submitted that the said respondent is still ready to 
honour the JVA entered into by the appellants and Respondent No.2 
and ready to complete the construction work with the cooperation of 
the appellants. He further submitted that the Irrevocable Power of 
Attorney was executed by the appellants in favour of Respondent 
No.2 after
receiving consideration of Rs.1.51 Crores, pursuant to 
which, the Respondent No.2 had entered into the agreement with 
the complainants.
7.	
The learned Senior counsel – Mr. Gopal Sankaranarayan drawing the 
attention of the Court to the alleged letter of revocation dated 12-8-
2014, submitted that even as per the said letter, the appellants had 
stated that they could not be liable for the acts of the Respondent 
No.2 “henceforth” meaning thereby after the said letter, however, 
the Respondent No.2 had entered into the agreement with the 
complainants i.e consumers prior to the said letter and pursuant to 
the JAV executed between the appellants and Respondent No.2, 
which has not been cancelled so far.
8.	
Having regard to the submissions made by the learned Senior 
counsels for the parties, and to the impugned Judgments and 
orders passed by the `State Commission’ as well as the `NCRDC’, it
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Akshay & Anr. v. Aditya & Ors.
clearly transpires that undisputedly an irrevocable power of attorney 
dated 6-7-2013 was executed by the appellants in favour of the 
Respondent No.2 along the JAV of the same date, pursuant to which 
the Respondent No.2 had undertaken to develop the land in question. 
It further appears that though allegedly the said power of attorney 
was revoked by the appellants vide the letter dated 12-8-2014, 
the JAV has not been revoked so far and the same still continues 
to be in force. As rightly submitted by the learned counsel for the 
respondents, in the letter daeted 12-8-2014, the appellants had stated 
to be not liable “Henceforth”, i.e. after the said letter was sent. The 
appellants therefore were bound by the acts/deeds of the Respondent 
No.2 carried out pursuant to the irrevocable Power of Attorney till 
it was terminated, in accordance with law. It is also not denied that 
the appellants have not taken any action whatsoever against the 
respondent No.2 with regard to the alleged non-compliance of the 
terms and conditions of JAV by the said Respondent. Under the 
circumstances, it does not lie in the mouth of the appellants to say 
that the appellants are not liable for the acts of Respondent No.2. 
9.	
The ‘NCDRC’ having considered all the issues with regard to the 
joint liability of the appellants as well as the Respondent No.2, we 
do not find any good ground to interfere with the same.
10.	 In that view of the
matter, the Appeals being devoid of merits and 
are dismissed.
Result of the case: Appeals dismissed.
†Headnotes prepared by: Divya Pandey