Understanding the Supreme Court's Stance on Property Ownership Documents
Author: Utkarsh Srivastava Advocate-on-Record, Supreme Court of India
This Article clears the confusion on Supreme Court’s Stance on Property Ownership Documents in judgment Mahnoor Fatima Imran Khan v. M/s Visweshwara Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd. 2025 INSC 646. Whether Hon’ble Supreme Court of India in its recent judgment held that Registered Sale Deed is not a valid document to prove ownership?
The answer is not that straight forward. However, the judgment in no manner decides that registered sale deed is not a valid document of ownership. The judgment has been passed on the basis of facts and circumstances of that case alone and has to be understood in that manner only and not otherwise.
In the said judgment the previous decision of the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India in Suraj Lamp & Industries Pvt. Ltd. v. State of Haryana & Anr. (2012) 1 SCC 656 has been differentiated on the fact that there was no issue regarding conveyance made on the strength of agreement of sale, General Power Attorney and Will. The issue in Suraj Lamp (Supra) was avoidance of execution and registration of deed of conveyance as a mode of transfer of freehold immovable property. This was right in the teeth of Sections 17 & S.49 of Registration Act. Sales were being done through SA/GPA/Will instead of proper registration of conveyance deed/sale deed. Therefore, it was held that registered conveyance deeds/sale deeds are the only valid documents to give validity to transfer of immovable property by sale.
The judgment in Suraj Lamp (Supra) has not been overruled, rather the present judgment has enforced the ratio in Suraj Lamp (Supra) that registered conveyance deeds/sale deeds are the only valid documents to give validity to transfer of immovable property by sale.
In Mahnoor Fatima (Supra), a society named M/s Bhavana Co-operative Housing Society had executed registered sale deeds in favour of Persons Claiming Ownership on the basis of an Agreement of Sale dated 19.3.1982. The said agreement was validated was first validated by Learned Assistant Registrar on 1.9.2006 and but was later on held fraudulent on 12.8.2015 by Deputy Registrar. The Agreement of Sale dated 19.03.1982 on the basis of which the said Bhavna Society had executed these sale deeds was itself never registered. There was nothing to show the validity of title. Therefore, the subsequent sale deeds by Bhavna Society to Persons Claiming Ownership were held to be not valid ownership documents because the source agreement was not valid.
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