The Supreme Court has restored a 1979 decree for specific performance, holding that a completed court-executed sale cannot be displaced decades later by an enhanced monetary refund.
The dispute arose from a 1975 agreement to sell agricultural land near Agra for ₹20,000. After the trial court decreed performance, the sale deed was executed through court in June 1979 and the purchaser remained in possession. Although the Allahabad High Court accepted the agreement’s validity, it attempted to balance equities by substituting the conveyance with ₹15 lakh plus interest.
The Supreme Court rejected that approach. Once ownership and possession had passed under the decree, the passage of time did not justify rewriting the completed transaction. Equity favoured the purchaser, who had paid the consideration and possessed the land for more than four decades. The trial decree was restored and the defendant’s ₹15 lakh deposit ordered refunded with accrued interest.
