Court No. - 33

Case :- WRIT - C No. - 45175 of 2010

Petitioner :- Smt. Pooja Chhabara

Respondent :- Chief Revenue Controlling Authority/Commissioner And Ors. Petitioner Counsel :- Rajesh Dwivedi

Respondent Counsel :- C.S.C.

Hon'ble Pankaj Mithal,J.

Heard learned counsel for the petitioner and learned Standing counsel for the respondents.

Aggrieved by the order dated 31.8.09 passed by Assistant Commissioner Stamp, and the appellate order dated 29.5.2010 passed by the Additional Commissioner Administration, the petitioner has preferred this writ petition.

Petitioner took a shop on rent an as per agreement dated 7.7.07. The said rent agreement was subjected to payment of stamp duty and by the impugned order stamp duty under Article 35(a)(ii) of Schedule 1-B of the Indian Stamp Act was levied on the basis of the monthly rent.

The submission of the learned counsel for the petitioner is that the rent agreement is only for 11 months and therefore, the authorities have erred in treating it to be of three years.

The rent agreement dated 7.7.07 which has been filed as Annexure-1 to the writ petition has been considered by me. In clause 5 of the said agreement, it has been specifically stated that the tenancy is for a period of three years though on expiry of every 11 months it has to be renewed. It is not the case of the petitioner that the tenancy has not been renewed. In view of the recitals in the rent deed itself, it is implicit that the tenancy is for a period of three years.

In this view of the matter the authorities below have not committed any error in leaving stamp duty on the same in accordance with the provisions of Article 35(a)(ii) of Schedule 1B of the Act, which provides for stamp duty on a lease for a term exceeding one year but not exceeding 5 years.

Accordingly, I am of the opinion that the writ petiton has no merit and is dismissed.

Order Date :- 3.8.2010

piyush