Registered Sale Deeds Without Lawful Foundation Insufficient to Confer Title: SC Clarifies

Introduction:

The Supreme Court of India delivered its judgment in the case of Mahnoor Fatima Imran & Ors. v. M/s Visweswara Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd. & Ors. on May 7, 2025. The conflict was not just about land ownership or possession but reflected years of overlapping claims, statutory interventions, and questions about the authenticity of transactions. At the heart of the dispute was whether the writ petitioners were entitled to protection from dispossession, despite concerns over the legitimacy of their title and the reality of their possession.

Background:

The dispute concerns about 53 acres located in Survey No. 83, an originally larger parcel of land of over 525 acres owned by eleven persons. On the subject land, in the 1970s, 99.07 acres were declared surplus under the Andhra Pradesh Land Reforms Act and thus vesting with the State, and additional land was allotted to public authorities under the Urban Land Ceiling Act. In 1982, a General Power of Attorney holder for the original owners entered into an agreement of sale with Bhavana Cooperative Housing Society. Bhavana’s Cooperative Housing Society was subsequently claimed other parties through registered sale deeds as owners of the property and respondents in the dispute. The State claimed the land through TSIIC asserting that the land had already vested with the government and thus could not be legally sold. In 2016, parties claiming through Bhavana’s Cooperative Society petitioned the High Court for protection from dispossession, and when their petition was dismissed by a Single Judge, The Division Bench granted relief, this appeal by the State to The Supreme Court followed.

Judgment:

The Supreme Court began by observing that the writ petition was brought on a limited scope – i.e., only restraining dispossession, which was not effected according to law. Still, the Court felt it was necessary to examine matters of fact context, and most importantly, the question of both title and possession claimed by petitioners. It remarked that the Single Judge did not render a decision on the petitioner’s title, but at the same time seriously questioned the legality of the title. But the Division Bench assumed that the petitioners’ previous possession followed a previous interim order of the court and assisted the petitioners in the faith of serious questions of law and facts that were involved. 

The Court further looked into the history of the land. The Supreme Court cited previous judgments in Omprakash Verma and N. Audikesava Reddy, which held that the larger portions of Survey No.83 had validly vested with the State in proceedings relating to the Land Reforms Act and Urban Land Ceiling Act, and affirmed that the vesting was determinative and legally binding.

The Court also looked at the documents on which petitioners had based their case. There were two versions of the agreement of sale for 1982. Both documents shared the same parties and date, yet were different regarding terms such as the quantity of land, mention of stated consideration, and payment details. These discrepancies unsettled the Court. It was noted on one agreement only a partial payment was mentioned, while payment of the whole consideration was indicated on the other. This raised doubts regarding these documents being genuine.

The sale agreement had never been registered and the specific performance suit filed by the Bhavana Society was already dismissed. A subsequent attempt to revive it also failed. Nevertheless, later buyers had obtained sale deeds based on the same agreement and claimed title. The Court was not persuaded these sale deeds were of any effect whatsoever since the original agreement was defective.

Possession was another area where the Court sought clarity. The petitioners had claimed that they were in possession of the land, but there was little evidence to support this. The Court observed that the two interim orders passed in earlier writ petitions did not establish possession. Neither order restrained the government from acting according to law. The Court found that there was no clear evidence showing that either the petitioners or the appellants were in continuous or lawful possession of the land.

As for the argument that registered sale deeds must be treated as valid unless challenged, the Court clarified that registration alone does not guarantee legal title. The underlying transaction must be lawful and capable of conferring title. Here, the sale deeds were based on an agreement that had no legal effect due to non-registration and because the land had already vested with the State by the time of the agreement. The Court concluded that the petitioners had failed to show valid title or actual possession.

The Court also referred to the State’s intention to reopen the proceedings concerning the 99.07 acres under Section 9-A of the Land Reforms Act. Although that action was not part of the present case, the Court stated that the State was within its rights to proceed under the statute, subject to legal scrutiny. The final conclusion was that the petitioners were not entitled to protection under Article 226 because they had neither established valid title nor proved possession. The judgment of the Division Bench was set aside, and the order of the Single Judge was restored.

Analysis:

The decision of the Supreme Court was the result of a conscientious evaluation of the relationship between statutory land vesting and private claims, particularly those supported by documents of dubious provenance. Far from characterizing the issue as a common pitfall of the petitioners’ papers, the Court looked beyond mere form to the substance of the petitioners’ complaints. It took a wide angle on the equine events and challenged the events that culminated in the allegation by the petitioners that they owned the property.

The problem was not only that a document either did or did not exist, or was or was not filed. What was really being considered was if the rights derived from such documents were legal and capable of being enforced. The Supreme Court having regard to the fact that the unregistered agreement was entered into at a time when the land had vested in the State, noted that it could not be treated to be a document which would create a lawful title between the parties, even if the subsequent transactions were registered. The Court also re-stated the rule that actual possession should never be inferred from court orders without it being proved as an independent fact.

Another important takeaway from the judgment was the Court’s approach to the State’s interest. The Court did not overlook the fact that the land had been statutorily acquired by the State decades earlier and was part of its public development efforts. It acknowledged the government’s concern that private claims based on flawed transactions could jeopardize public interest, particularly in areas where land values have risen and the pressure of urbanization is high.

Conclusion:

The judgment addressed a land dispute rooted in competing narratives of ownership, possession, and legality. The Supreme Court refused to grant relief where it found inconsistencies in documents, lack of proof of possession, and a long history of the land being treated as vested with the State. The judgment clarified that the rule of law must prevail over private claims based on incomplete or questionable transactions.