Courts Cannot Compel Plaintiff To Accept Compensation In Lieu Of Injunction When No Such Prayer Made : Supreme Court

The Supreme Court has held that it is legally impermissible for an Appellate Court to award a relief not prayed for in the pleadings. Also, the Appellate Court cannot, upon setting aside the decree, remand the matter to the executing court for adjudication of issues not arising from any subsisting decree.

A Bench of Justice S.V.N. Bhatti and Justice Atul S. Chandurkar set aside the Punjab and Haryana High Court's judgment, which had substituted decrees directing the removal of alleged encroachments with an award of compensation to the plaintiffs.

The dispute arose from two civil suits filed by the plaintiff against respondents, seeking removal of an allegedly encroaching wall and a lintel erected on the wall of his house. The Trial Court decreed both suits, directing removal of the structures and restraining further construction. These decrees were upheld by the first Appellate Court.

In second appeals, the Punjab and Haryana High Court modified the decrees by directing the defendants to pay compensation and treating the disputed wall as a common wall. In 2013, the Supreme Court set aside those judgments for failure to frame substantial questions of law under Section 100 CPC and remanded the matters.

Upon remand, the High Court again set aside the decrees and directed the Executing Court to assess the value of the constructions and award compensation to the plaintiffs. Aggrieved, the legal heirs of the original plaintiff once again approached the Supreme Court.

Allowing the appeals, the judgment authored by Justice Chandurkar held that the High Court had erred on two counts. First, it compelled the appellant-plaintiffs to accept monetary compensation despite no such relief having been sought in the pleadings. Second, it wrongly directed the Executing Court to assess the value of the wall for determining compensation after setting aside the decrees in favour of the plaintiffs. The Court observed that once the decrees had been set aside, no executable decree survived, leaving no occasion for the Executing Court to undertake any such exercise.

“There was no prayer whatsoever made by the original plaintiff seeking any damages or compensation from the defendants for the encroachment committed by them. In absence of any such relief sought by the original plaintiff, the decree passed in his favour could not have been set aside by the High Court by compelling his legal heirs to accept compensation that was directed to be assessed by a valuer. The legal heirs of the plaintiff did not consent for such course to be followed. The High Court, therefore, could not have undertaken such exercise of seeking to compensate one party at the cost of the other without any prayer being made in that regard.”, the Court observed.

“Once the decrees passed by the Trial Court in favour of the plaintiff were set aside (by the High Court), there would be no occasion for the Executing Court to proceed with the execution proceedings since there would be no decree holding the field for being executed. In such a situation, directing the Executing Court to assess the value of the wall in question would be requiring it to undertake an exercise not supported by any decree whatsoever. Indeed, the course adopted by the High Court does not find support under Order XXI of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908.”, the Court added

Also, the Court found that since the High Court's decision in a second appeal, was not based on merits, as no substantial question of law was framed, it requested the High Court to reconsider both the appeals in accordance with Section 100 of the Code and decide the same on their own merits expeditiously, given that the Second Appeals are of the year 2008.

Headnote

Civil Procedure – Second Appeal under Section 100 CPC – Reversal of Concurrent Decrees on Irrelevant Considerations – Substitution of Relief Without Prayer or Consent – Permissibility – Held that the High Court cannot set aside a concurrent decree for mandatory injunction and compel the plaintiffs to accept monetary compensation in the absence of any prayer for damages/compensation made by the plaintiff or consent given by their legal heirs - The High Court committed a grave error by reversing the well-reasoned decrees of the Trial Court and first Appellate Court to direct the Executing Court to assess the value of an illegal construction for monetary compensation - Such a course is entirely unsupported by Order XXI of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, because once a decree is set aside, no executable decree remains in the field for the Executing Court to act upon - a Second Appeal cannot be disposed of by answering hypothetical questions in favor of the defendants without properly formulating and adjudicating actual substantial questions of law under Section 100 CPC - Impugned judgments set aside, and matters remanded to the High Court for fresh, expeditious disposal on merits - the Supreme Court explicitly held that modifying decrees and awarding monetary compensation without entering into the merits of the controversy or framing substantial questions of law is legally impermissible - The High Court's failure to adhere to this binding historical remand order in the same case structure forms the primary basis of the current reversal. [Relied on Rajat Kumar & Ors. v. S D Adarsh Jain Kanya Maha Vidyalaya Sadhaura & Ors. (Civil Appeal Nos. 8203 of 2013 and 8281 of 2013; Paras 5, 6]

Cause Title: RAJAT KUMAR AND OTHERS VERSUS S D ADARSH JAIN KANYA MAHA VIDYALAYA SADHAURA AND OTHERS

Citation : 2026 LiveLaw (SC) 637

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Appearance:

For Appellant(s) : Ms. Sangeeta Kumar, AOR Ms. Vidushi Garg, Adv.

For Respondent(s) : None