M/s Haryana Tractor, G.T. Road, Hansi vs State Bank of India and Other

S.P. Goyal, J.—The Petitioner filed an application in the trial Court for permission to deposit the amount of the stamp duty and penalty on two receipts produced by him which was rejected by the impugned order. Hence this revision.

A perusal of the impugned order betrays utter lack of the concept about the provision of Section 35 of the Stamp Act on the part of the trial Court. A party has an absolute right to make good the deficiency of the stamp duty payable on any document together with the penalty except in the case of those documents which are stated to be inadmissible if they are not stamped at the time of their execution. A receipt being not one of those documents, the Court had no jurisdiction to deny the right to a party to make good the deficiency in accordance with the provisions of the statute. It is surprising that even though a direct decision of this Court was cited but the trial Court overlooked it on a wholly untenable and misconceived ground that it was not mentioned that the deficiency was more than 10 paise. This petition is consequently allowed and the impugned order reversed. The parties, through their counsel, have been directed to appear in the trial Court on February 16, 1987. No costs.