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14. The above ruling will apply on all fours to this case. We agree with the view expressed therein and hold that the plaintiff is not disentitled to get a decree for specific performance on the facts of the present case.

15. It is then contended that the plaintiff having made a false statement in the course of the evidence is not entitled to get the equitable relief of specific performance. Our attention is drawn to the judgments of this Court in Subbarayudu v. Tatayya 1937 M.W.N. 1158 and S. Sankaran v. N.G. Radhakrishnan (1994)2 L.W. 642. In the former case, a Division Bench held that the plaintiff was not entitled to specific performance, because he gave false testimony and because to grant him the relief would be doing injustice to the fourth respondent therein. The fourth respondent in that case was a subsequent agreement-holder. It was found that the plaintiff did not take any steps to prevent the first defendant from conveying the property to the fourth defendant and he sat by while the fourth respondent spent money on improving the property. There was a mortgage of it and the fourth respondent discharged it. It was in such circumstances, the court refused to grand specific performance to the plaintiff.

16. In the latter case, the plaintiff wanted a decree for specific performance with a variation and not in terms of the contract as such. The court found that he had put forward a false claim and he was trying to use the court as an instrument of oppression to gain an unfair advantage over the defendant. The Bench refused to grant specific performance on those findings.

17. The principle that the equitable relief of specific performance cannot be granted to a person who has put forward a false case is based on the doctrine that one who seeks equity must do equity. But the question whether the plaintiff is dis-entitled to claim the relief with depend on the facts of each case. If, in a particular case, a false claim set up by the plaintiff is immaterial and does not affect the main case in any manner, the court shall not refuse the relief. In the present case, the plaintiff has correctly stated in the plaint that he had received a sum of Rs. 13,500 in cash under Ex.B-1. He has also correctly stated that the defendants have not discharged the loan due to the society. But in his deposition, the plaintiff has for the first time said that he received a sum of Rs. 11,500 only in cash. No doubt that person is not proved. But the same does not in any way, affect the merits of the case. According to the deposition, a sum of Rs. 2,000 was retained by the defendants to discharge the loan due to one Munian. He has not stated in the deposition that the loan due to the said Munian was not discharged and, therefore, he was entitled to deduct that sum also from the amount payable to the defendants for getting reconveyance. He has categorically stated in the plaint that he is prepared to deposit in court whatever is the amount due to the defendants. In such circumstances, the version put forward in the deposition, even if it is false, cannot disentitle the plaintiff from getting the relief. The said version has not in any way misled the defendants or led to any injustice.

Where the plaintiff's non-performance is of a separate and collateral contract, although relating to the same subject-matter and entered into simultaneously with the agreement which it is sought to enforce, it does not constitute a defence.

19. In Ramjanam Bharthi v. Dhurandhar Kuer , the suit was for specific performance of an agreement under which the defendant had agreed to execute a deed of usufructuary mortgage for a certain amount. The plaintiff thought it proper to get the deed prepared on the stamp paper showing that it had been executed by the defendant, though the defendant had not actually done so. Beyond that, the plaintiff had not done anything and in fact, no amount was shown in the deed as due from the defendant higher than that agreed to; nor the property mentioned in the deed differed from or in excess of that agreed between them. The Court held that the fraud played by the plaintiff was not of such a nature as to bring in the application of the principle of law that the person who has not come to court with clean hands is not entitled to get the equitable relief of specific performance. The following passage in the judgment is relevant:

21. We are in agreement with the view expressed by the learned Judge in the above passage. We hold that in the facts of the present case, the statement of the plaintiff made in the deposition for the first time which runs counter to the recitals in Ex.B-1 does not disentitle him from getting the equitable relief of specific performance of the contract.

22. It is contended by learned Counsel for the plaintiff that the principle that equitable relief should not be granted to a person who has approached the court with unclean hands, cannot be as strictly enforced in a suit for specific performance of an agreement of reconveyance as in the case of a suit for specific performance of other agreements. It is submitted by him that in the case of reconveyance agreement, the plaintiff is seeking to get back his own property, which he had earlier placed in the name of the defendant in order to get over a financial crisis. But in the other case, a person seeks to become the owner of the property for the first time by enforcing an agreement. There is considerable force in this argument and we are inclined to accept the same. In the case of an agreement for reconveyance, the court cannot adopt the same stringent standards as are applicable to a case of enforcement of other agreements. The person who was the owner of the property and had, by force of circumstances, to part with the same for a temporary period and the purchaser being fully aware of the same, having undertaken to restore the status quo ante by reconveying the property for the same amount of consideration cannot be placed on the same pedestal as a person who seeks to enquire ownership of the property for the first time by enforcing an agreement. Hence, on the facts and circumstances of the case, we hold that the plaintiff is not guilty of any act which would prevent him from getting the decree for specific performance.