Refund fee for out of court settlement

Justice S M Subramaniam on holding that Section 69-A of the Tamil Nadu Court Fees and Suit Valuation Act would be applicable in respect of appeal suits, more specifically, for refund of Court fee, wherein the issues are settled out of court between the parties, said, “Encouraging the parties to settle the issues out of Court is the concept now being developed on account of huge pendency of cases. Various schemes are introduced, enabling the parties to the litigation to settle the disputes out of Court. Thus, the encouragement for development of such schemes must be to refund the Court fee.”However, he also noted that the Courts are bound to ascertain the legality of the settlement and once such settlements are found proper and legally made, then the Court should make refund of full amount of Court fee under Section 69-A of the Court Fee Act.

Justice Subramaniam was passing orders on a plea moved by Sakthi Finance Limited seeking to direct the registry of this Court to refund the court fee as the court had closed the plea as withdrawn after accounting for the out of court settlement.

The judge also pointed out that once the appeal suit is settled out of Court before disposal, either through the Arbitrator, Conciliator, Mediator or through Lok Adalat pursuant to the orders of the Court or settled between the parties through their own Conciliators, Mediators or through the respective counsels appearing on behalf of the parties, then also the parties are entitled for refund of full Court fee with reference to Section 69-A of the Court Fee Act. In the event of dishonouring the entitlement of refund, then the same would cause discrimination amongst the same class of people, who had settled the civil disputes out of Court and such a discrimination is not only unconstitutional, but in violation of the very spirit and scope of the amended Section 69-A of the Tamil Nadu Court Fees and Suit Valuation Act, Justice Subramaniam added.