Supreme Court allows belated plaint amendment to avoid splitting one title dispute into many suits

The legal heirs of a man who had sued in 2009 for declaration of title, possession and rectification of two sale deeds over land in Cuttack later discovered that the defendants relied on a compromise decree the original plaintiff was never a party to, and obtained certified copies of the relevant records only in June 2020. They then sought to amend their plaint under Order VI Rule 17 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 to plead these facts. Both the trial court and, on revision, the High Court of Orissa refused the amendment. The Supreme Court (B.V. Nagarathna and R. Mahadevan, JJ.) allowed it.

It held that the proviso to Order VI Rule 17, which bars amendment after the trial has begun unless the party could not have raised the matter earlier despite due diligence, was satisfied here: the disputed chain of title, the plaintiff's claimed exclusion from the compromise proceedings, and the late discovery of the compromise decree were not mere omission or negligence. The Court also treated avoidance of multiplicity of proceedings as relevant to the discretion under Order VI Rule 17, since refusing the amendment risked splitting a single title dispute into separate suits with a risk of conflicting findings on the same land. It allowed the amendment on payment of Rs. 25,000 in costs, while leaving limitation, the validity of the compromise decree, and the merits open for the trial court.