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5. The third respondent filed counter affidavit opposing the writ petition. It is stated that Syed Waheed Ahmed was very well known to the third respondent, who is a nanogenarian. The former was well aware of the family properties of the third respondent. The property in survey Nos. 181/1 to 181/6 and 182 belongs to two sons of the third respondent, namely, Akber Ali Khan and Farooq Ali Khan, who are Non Resident Indians. One Ghulam Rasool Faruqi and others filed suits being O.S. No. 463 of 2002 and O.S. No. 73 of 2004 in respect of the said land making a false claim. As he was not able to look after the Court cases, the third respondent gave General Power of Attorney to Syed Waheed Ahmed to enable him to defend the cases. It is alleged that documents executed by him are only deeds of special power of attorney, the third respondent, executed documents. But, taking advantage of the same, subsequently, Syed Waheed Ahmed, registered agreement of sale-cum-General Power of Attorney containing a clause empowering to sell the lands in Nagaram village. Having come to know this, the third respondent registered revocation of the agreement of sale-cum-General Power of Attorney and cancelled the sale deeds executed by Syed Waheed Ahmed including the one in favour of the writ petitioner. As the document cancelling the sale deed is compulsorily registrable, so as to save innocent public from being cheated, the third respondent executed cancellation deed, which is valid and in accordance with law. Syed Waheed Ahmed was never authorised to sell the property and he was only given Power of Attorney to represent and defend the Court cases. Therefore, the sale deed obtained by the petitioner is vitiated by mischief and fraud for unlawful enrichment. Therefore, a declaration to bring to the notice of the public about the fraud, and extinguish and limit the rights of the purchaser therein was very much required. The action of the Sub-Registrar, therefore, does not suffer from any illegality or impropriety.

SUBMISSIONS FOR RESPONDENTS:

14. Learned Counsel for the respondents, Sri Mahamood Ali (in W.P. Nos. 25661 of 2005 etc.,) Sri Y. Srinivasa Murthy (in W.P. No. 879 of 2006 etc.,), and Sri M.S. Ramachandra Rao (in W.P. No. 22298 of 2004 etc.,) vehemently opposed the writ petitions. At the very outset, all the counsel submit that the dispute between vendor and vendee or true owner and transferee regarding the validity of a sale transaction in respect of immovable property is not amenable to writ jurisdiction as it is a private law dispute. Secondly, they would urge that in all the matters the vendees obtained sale deeds from persons, who had no valid title or authority to execute sale deeds, and from person, who played fraud on the real owners and without proper compliance with the requirements of law. These issues require recording and appreciating evidence before arriving at conclusions on the questions of fact and, therefore, writ petition is not proper remedy to adjudicate and resolve the controversy. They nextly contend that the Registering Officers are bound to register any document, which is compulsorily registrable under Section 17 of the Registration Act or which is presented before the Registering Officer as a document optionally registrable. According to the learned counsel, Section 35 of the Registration Act contemplates only two situations when the Registering Officer can refuse a registration and the scope of Section 35 cannot be enlarged by the Court, which would amount to legislation. They urge that though under Rule 26 of the Registration Rules, the Registering Officers are entitled to examine the document, they have no judicial powers to decide the inter se rights of the parties to the document presented for registration or the rights of the parties who are likely to be affected by such registration. They would also urge that to decide whether cancellation of a document is valid, is essentially a function of the judiciary and any dilution of the principle would impinge the doctrine of separation of powers inherent in constitutional scheme. Judicial functions are not conferred on the Registering Officers and by judicial interpretation such power cannot be conferred on the Registering Officers. It is lastly contended that when the legislature has employed plain language, consequence of enforcement of law notwithstanding the Court cannot assume any ambiguity so as to enlarge the scope by supplying casus omissus, which can only be remedied by legislation. In support of these submissions, learned Counsel placed reliance on Property Association of Baptist Churches (supra), Union of India v. S.B. Vohra , M. Varalakshmi v. K. Mahadeva Sastry (died) and Ors. 2004 (4) ALD 371 (D.B.), State of Rajasthan v. Basant Nahata and Kamepalli Sitaramaiah v. Nalluri Krishna Mohana Rao 2006 (1) L.S. 174.

6. M/s. M.R.K. Chowdary and K. Ramakrishna Reddy, senior Advocates and N. Subba Reddy, V. Venkata Ramana, J. Prabhakar and H. Venugopal, learned counsel, have appeared for petitioners. The main thrust of their contentions is on the fact that the Registration Act has been enacted with a view to provide information to people, who may deal with property, as to the nature and extent of the rights, which, persons may have, affecting that property. They further contend that there would have been no need for having an Act like the Registration Act if it was not felt necessary that people should know and people should be able to find out whether any particular property with which they may be concerned, had been subjected to any liability or legal obligation. Therefore, the scheme of the Registration Act provides that one should give importance and solemnity to certain classes of documents by directing that they shall be compulsorily registrable and the general purpose of the Act appears to be to put on record somewhere the particulars of ownership of property where people can examine those particulars if they are interested in such properties. It also appears from the scheme of the Registration Act that the Act reduces the chances of fraud. It is further contended by the learned Counsel for the petitioners that sale is governed by the provisions of Transfer of Property Act, 1882 (hereinafter referred to as 'the TP Act') and 'sale' is defined under Section 54 of the TP Act as, ""Sale" is a transfer of ownership in exchange for a price paid or promised or part-paid and part-promised. "It further lays down that in case of such transfer, in the case of tangible immovable property of the value of one hundred rupees and upwards, can only be made by a reqistered instrument, and Section 17 of the Registration Act makes a sale deed compulsorily registerable. Therefore, it is contended on behalf of petitioners that it is not the registration of the document which is sought to be cancelled by preparing cancellation deeds and getting them registered, in effect, what is sought to be done is cancellation of the sale itself, which is not permissible. Sale, by its definition in the TP Act, is a transfer of ownership in exchange of consideration, which means that there cannot be a unilateral sale. A person must be owner of the property and he should sell it to another person in exchange for a price paid or promised or part-paid or part-promised. There is no concept of a unilateral sale. Sale is always bilateral. It is true there can be many owners and many purchasers but sale is incomplete unless the document is registered, which is a requirement under Section 54 of the TP Act and also under Section 17 of the Registration Act. It is well settled that transfer of ownership means a transfer by a person of his rights and interests in the property in full and permanently. A transfer of a part only of such interests or for a particular period reserving the rest for the transferor himself is not a transfer of ownership. It has also been held by Courts that where a transfer is made for a price paid or promised and the deed is registered, a sale is duly effected and the propriety interest in the property passes. In this connection, reference can be made to (1) Sahadeo Singh v. Kuber Nath Lal , and (2) Kalyan v. Mt. Desrani AIR 1927 All. 361. This Court in Kutcherlakota Vijayalakshmi v. Radimeti Rajaratnamba , even went to the extent of saying that purchaser gets title as soon as the sale deed is registered even if the consideration is not paid and it further held that the remedy for the vendor was to claim consideration.

17. To the same effect, reference can also be made to the Supreme Court judgments in Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd. v. Saw Pipes Ltd. and also in State of Rajasthan v. Basant Nahata .

18. Lastly, it was contended by the respondents that under no provision of law the Sub-Registrar is required to register a document after an enquiry as to the ownership of the property with respect to which a document is sought to be registered. It may be true that there is no such provision in the Registration Act, but if strictly interpreted, then the Registration Act would not empower the registering authority to register any document unless it falls within Section 17 or 18 of the Registration Act. Section 17 mentions those documents which are compulsorily registrable and Section 18 mentions those documents, of which, the registration is optional, but, the whole scheme of the Registration Act shows that it is incumbent upon the Registrar not to register documents that are unlawful. Obviously if a person has no right in the property and his interests in the property had extinguished, if he tries to execute any document for the same property, the document would be illegal. If 'A' executes a document with 'B' that he would kill 'C' on payment of a consideration and if such a document is presented before the Sub-Registrar, is the Sub-Registrar duty bound to register such a document? If 'A' executes a sale deed conveying the title of 'Charminar' or High Court for consideration, is the Sub-Registrar bound to register such a document? Besides, in the present case, the documents themselves show that the property had already been conveyed by a registered document, therefore, no enquiry was needed to be conducted. It is only on mere reading of the document that Sub-Registrar would come to a conclusion that the document, which was sought to be registered, was an illegal document and as such could not be registered. Therefore, the argument of the learned Counsel for respondents that the Sub-Registrar has no authority to make enquiries with regard to the title of the parties who executes the documents, would have to be accepted with exceptions. That may be true, but if the document itself shows that the party who executes the document has no title over the property, the Sub-Registrar is not bound to register such a document. The scheme of the Registration Act shows that documents which create interest or extinguish interest are either compulsorily registrable or are to be registered at the option of the executor. Besides this, what is sought to be revoked by this cancellation deed, is the earlier registered sale deed. One of the documents we are taking as an example is the cancellation deed filed in Writ Petition No. 22257 of 2004, which reads as under-