Plaintiff Cannot Rewrite a Specific Performance Suit After Defendant Agrees to Perform Contract: Punjab & Haryana High Court Holds Order VI Rule 17 CPC Cannot Be Used to Abandon Specific Performance and Substitute a Recovery Suit on a New Cause of Action

Case Name: Kim Infrastructures and Developers Ltd. v. M/s K.B. Machine and Factory & Others

Date of Judgment: 27 July 2026

Citation: CR-5713-2019

Bench: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Deepak Gupta

Held: The Punjab and Haryana High Court dismissed a civil revision petition challenging the rejection of an application under Order VI Rule 17 CPC, holding that while courts ordinarily adopt a liberal approach towards amendment of pleadings, such discretion cannot be exercised to permit a plaintiff to fundamentally alter the nature and foundation of a suit. The Court ruled that a plaintiff cannot use the amendment jurisdiction to delete the principal relief of specific performance, erase pleadings regarding readiness and willingness, and convert the suit into one for recovery of earnest money and damages by introducing an altogether new factual and legal basis. If a plaintiff merely intends to abandon the relief of specific performance, the appropriate remedy lies under Order XXIII CPC and not through an amendment that substitutes the original cause of action.

Summary: The petitioner instituted a suit seeking specific performance of an agreement to sell executed in 2012 for immovable property valued at over ₹7.63 crore, asserting continuous readiness and willingness to perform the contract while also claiming recovery of earnest money and damages as an alternative relief. During the pendency of the suit, one of the partners of the defendant firm died and was substituted by legal representatives claiming under a registered Will. Subsequently, the defendants expressed their willingness to honour the agreement and sought a decree for specific performance in favour of the plaintiff. Instead of pressing for adjudication of that application, the plaintiff initiated proceedings regarding the legal heirs and thereafter sought amendment of the plaint under Order VI Rule 17 CPC by deleting the relief of specific performance, removing all pleadings concerning readiness and willingness, introducing allegations relating to title disputes and shortage in the property area, and converting the suit into one confined to recovery of earnest money and damages.

The High Court found that the proposed amendments were not necessitated by any genuine subsequent event but represented a conscious shift in litigation strategy after the defendants expressed willingness to perform the contract. It further observed that the very basis of the plaintiff’s apprehension regarding defective title had ceased to exist because the civil suit and subsequent appeal challenging the registered Will had already been dismissed. The Court held that the proposed amendments sought to substitute the original cause of action by introducing an entirely inconsistent factual foundation rather than merely clarifying or elaborating existing pleadings. Such an exercise, it held, falls outside the permissible scope of Order VI Rule 17 CPC.

Relying upon settled principles governing amendment of pleadings, the Court distinguished precedents permitting amendments that merely enhanced compensation or added alternative relief while retaining the principal claim for specific performance. It emphasized that there is a clear legal distinction between seeking compensation in addition to or substitution for specific performance without abandoning the original cause of action, and completely transforming a suit for specific performance into a money recovery action founded on new allegations. The Court concluded that if the plaintiff genuinely wished to relinquish the relief of specific performance, the Code of Civil Procedure already provided the appropriate mechanism under Order XXIII CPC. Since the trial court had exercised its discretion on sound judicial principles and without any jurisdictional error or perversity, no interference under Article 227 of the Constitution was warranted.

Decision: The Punjab and Haryana High Court dismissed the civil revision petition, upheld the trial court’s refusal to permit amendment of the plaint under Order VI Rule 17 CPC, and held that the plaintiff could not fundamentally transform a suit for specific performance into a recovery suit by introducing a new factual and legal foundation through amendment.