The court disposed of an writ petition by a purchaser who erroneously bid 26.15 crores instead of 2.61 crores during an online auction. The petitioner sought refund of the entire earnest money deposit amidst a clerical mistake.
Direction to refund balance EMD to petitioner after deducting auction expenses within four weeks.
This page shows the compact analysis of this judgement. The full analysis — procedural history, issue-by-issue holdings with ratio and obiter, advocates, and paragraph-level evidence for every claim — is being added to the record in batches and will appear here when this judgement has been through it.
THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTI CE V. RAMASUBRAMANI AN AND
THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTI CE G. SHYAM PRASAD
WRI T PETI TI ON No.18129 of 2016
Betw een:
M/s. S.N. Construction & Developers, Rep. by its Managing Partner S. Sukumar
PETITIONER And
The State Bank of India, Stressed Assets Recovery Branch (SARB), 2nd Floor, APSRTC Commuter Amenity Centre, Business terminal Complex, Koti, Hyderabad -500 095 Rep. by its Authorised Officer.
RESPONSENT
VRS,J & GSP,J. W.P.No.18129/2016
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THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTI CE V. RAMASUBRAMANI AN AND THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTI CE G. SHYAM PRASAD
WRI T PETI TI ON No.18129 of 2016
ORDER: (Per Hon’ble Sri Justice V. Ramasubramanian)
An auction purchaser, whose online bid became a disaster on account of the wrong filling of the digits in a digital system, has come up with the present writ petition seeking a Mandamus to direct the respondent-Bank to refund the Earnest Money Deposit of Rs.22,00,000/made by him.
VRS,J & GSP,J. W.P.No.18129/2016
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conduct of auction. This auction was cancelled and a subsequent auction was conducted, which has also become the subject matter of yet another writ petition. In such circumstances, we are of the considered view that while forfeiture of the entire EMD will be unjust to the petitioner, a direction to refund the entire EMD to the petitioner will be unjust to the Bank. Therefore, the writ petition is disposed of directing the Bank to deduct whatever are the expenses incurred in the conduct of the auction on 11.03.2016 and refund the balance EMD amount to the petitioner within a period of four weeks from the date of receipt of a copy of this order.
stand closed. There shall be no order as to costs.
__________________________ JUSTI CE V. RAMASUBRAMANI AN _______________________ JUSTI CE G. SHYAM PRASAD
29th November, 2016 Js.
VRS,J & GSP,J. W.P.No.18129/2016
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THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTI CE V. RAMASUBRAMANI AN AND
THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTI CE G. SHYAM PRASAD
WRI T PETI TI ON No.18129 of 2016
Date: 29-11-2016
Js.
2 issues framed by the court
Whether forfeiture of entire earnest money deposit is fair given a clerical error in online bidding.
Whether petitioners refund claim should be reduced by auction expenses incurred by the bank.
M/s. S.N. Construction & Developers, Rep. by its Managing Partner S. Sukumar
The State Bank of India, Stressed Assets Recovery Branch
V. Ramasubramanian
G. Shyam Prasad
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
