2003 PLP 789 (SCMR)

KHALIL-UR-REHMAN RAMDAY, J.

Claiming to be the lessees in possession of 64 Kanals and 5 Marlas of the land in question Muhammad Rafique; his three brothers, namely, Hassan Muhammad, Muhammad Rasheed and Bashir Ahmed and one Muhammad Iqbal had alleged that the owner of the said land; namely, Abdul Aziz had agreed to sell the said land to them for a total consideration of Rs.3,60,

000. They had further asserted that an agreement with respect to the above mentioned alleged sale was executed between the parties on 18-12-1987 in pursuance of which the said vendees had paid an amount of Rs.1,60,000 to the said Abdul Aziz and that the balance amount was to be paid at the time of the registration of the sale-deed. The said Muhammad Rafique and others felt aggrieved of the sale of the said land by the said Abdul Aziz to one Abdul Hafeez in March, 1988 i.e. during the subsistence of the above-mentioned alleged sale agreement which led the said Muhammad Rafique etc. to the filing of the civil suit in the Court of a learned Civil Judge at Samundari which civil suit was however, dismissed on 4-3-1996. The said plaintiffs then approached the Lahore High Court with R. F. A. No. 147 of 1996 impugning the judgment dismissing their suit but this appeal was also dismissed through a judgment dated 21-10-1998. Hence this petition.

2. The reasons which had weighted with the learned trial Judge as also with the Honourable High Court in dismissing the suit of the petitioners inter aria, were that Abdul Aziz defendant had categorically denied, on oath, the execution of the agreement (Exh. P 1) and the execution of the receipt (Exh.P:2) and the onus lay heavily on the plaintiffs to prove the execution: of the said documents; that the plaintiffs never took any steps to have the signatures of the said Abdul Aziz proved through the evidence of any Handwriting Expert; that in spite of the admission of Abrar Ahmed P.W.2 deed-writer, who had allegedly written the said agreement that he was legally obliged to mention the writing of the said document by him in a register maintained for the purpose in which he was also obliged to secure the signatures of the parties, he had neither mentioned the' authoring of these documents by him in the said register nor had he secured the signatures of the parties in the same; that one of the plaintiffs namely Muhammad Rafique (P W.4) claimed to have purchased the stamp paper on which the agreement was written from a stamp vendor, namely, Ghazanfar Bhatti with his place of business in the Court of Assistant Commissioner on a Friday which was not a working day; that the P. Ws. were at variance with each other with respect to the actual place where the agreement was written in the hospital of Dr. Saleem; that P.W.1 and P.W.3 who were the attesting witnesses of Exh.P.l and Exh.P.2 respectively, admitted that they were not known to the parties and just happened who have come to Dr. Saleem's hospital to take some medicines when were requested to become marginal witnesses of the document in question, was a strange conduct on the part of the parties inviting strangers to become witnesses to the execution of a document and that the attesting witnesses had not sought the identification of the alleged owner executing the said document namely Abdul Aziz. These reasons, amongst others, could not be said unsound or whimsical. No exception could thus be taken to the concurrent findings of the two learned Courts.

3. In this view of the matter this petition is without merit which is' accordingly dismissed and the leave refused. Q.M.H./M-41515 Petition dismissed.