Mental agony and harassment of a senior citizen, request for help
sina
(Querist) 20 June 2012
This query is : Resolved
Hello,
I want to tell you a unfortunate story of my father and i really need a suggestion from you.
My father gave his property on lease to a Goverment owned oil company. The leased was for 30 years, upon completion of which the lease can be extended for another 20 years. Because the dealer was not taking care of public safety, doing some unethical things and company did not pay the rent so my father did not want to renew the lease for rest 20 years. After spending 10 years on court case, the court judged that my father has to renew the lease as per original lease terms.
My father was prepared to sign the lease but then company has started to include more clauses in the new lease draft. These were not part of the original lease deed terms and conditions. Since my father did not want to sign such a lease, there was a to and fro to arrive upon the right lease conitions. But unfortunately that never happened. Since 2009, when they got the lower court judgement in their favor, they have been using force and coersion to forcibly occupy the property (without a valid lease), and also falsly lodge police compliants about my father (My father was in the United States with me at that time). They are doing all sorts of non-sense to upset my father and create pressure on him.
Since then my father mental health has deteriorated. Doctor has prescribed him sleeping pills. He has got high blood pressure. My father has given us education and better live. But at the end of his age he is struggling with depression and stress. More over, i met with an accident last year and at that time my father came to US. My condition was critical here and while he was away from our ancestral home, the oil company wrote a FIR against my parents stating that my parents were creating obstacle for their labourers who were working on the property. They did not stop there they were trying to take the possession of our property with out having the lease signed by my parents. All these things add more stress to my father. I can not be with my father physically at this time as i live with my Husband far away from home.
But I want to ensure that i help him get justice. Is there a way that i can do that? Which court should i go to file a case for mental harassment? I know this kind of things happen in our country and we do not take it seriously, but i saw my father from my childhood and i and all my sisters are only concerned about his health and mental state. I can not allow anyone to harras him because my father had signed a lease.
Can some one please help me? which court i should go how to proceed? What Area/Specialization of law/lawyer deals with this kind of a case?
Devajyoti Barman
(Expert) 20 June 2012
Well, we can appreciate the agony of your father but the dispute arises from a civil dispute out of executing a certain lese.
Unfortunately no concrete relief lies for the harassment your father suffered. Even if you file a suit for damages that would not be of much merit.
In the present circumstance it is advisable to renew the lease as per the directions of the court on mutual agreeable terms and conditions.
However if the acts of the Company has criminal overtone then your father may lodge complaint to the Police under appropriate provisions of Penal Code.
sina
(Querist) 20 June 2012
Thanks Sir for your response. As i told earlier that we already shown our intention to sign the lease as per original lease with out any modification and addition. Court order is also the same. But the question is they are pushing my parents sign the lease which is not acceptable and against the court order and for which they falsly lodge police compliants about my father (My father was in the United States with me at that time).They did not stop there they were trying to take the possession of our property with out having the lease signed by my parents. All these things add more stress to my father. I am sure there must be some way to get them the justice. I am looking forward for more opinion on this please.
Shashikant V. Patil
(Expert) 20 June 2012
If you want to renew then both the parties have to accept the terms and conditions of lease. If you want to discontinued, issue legal notice to the said Co. for termination of lease which might be a clause inserted in the said lease. Your father is a bonafied owner of said property , they can alter the ownership. You can also lodge a police complaint against the said Co. as advised by Shri Barman.
sina
(Querist) 22 June 2012
Thank You for your input.
So what i understand from your opinion is
There is no way that i can bring the company to the court for harassing my father even though
1. We can prove that my father's health has deteriorated since they have been doing fraud and trying to illegally get the possession
of our land.
2. We can prove that they were illegally trying to change the structure of the property even though we had a IPC 145 ruling from the
court for the said land.
3.We can prove that their draft for the lease renewal didn't align with the original lease deed when the lower court judgement was to
renew the lease in exact same lines of the original lease.
Let me tell you more about our current situation
Post the lower court decision, there were too many tos and fros for arriving on the final lease renewal draft. When they did not
stick to the original lease terms as per the court judgement, we decided to ignore them and file an appeal for revisiting the
judgement in our case. Moreover, we did not get the rent from the oil company for the past 11 years. Although this was proved in the
lower court, the final judgement did not have any verdict about the unpaid rent. So, those were the driving factors about why we
appealed.
Ironically, even after 10 hearing dates given by the court, our lawyer was unable to get our appeal approved. It is important to
mention that out of 10 hearing dates, the Judge was physically npresent in only 3 dates. And this spanned over 2 years now, and our
appeal is not not granted.
I got to know that we can file petition in Hon High Court to expedite our case and finish it within 6 months. But as per our lawyer
that way we are going to offended the local judge who is going to give the judgement of the current appeal. Meanwhile, I came to the
US for a temporary job deputation. My parents came to visit me last year in the US. At that time, the oil company were trying to get
the possession of our land without having the lease signed. They put labourers to work day and night to reform the land before
starting business. My sister in India, filed a criminal case against them and got IPC 145 ruling for our land. Now we came to know
that they have lodged a case for "EXECUTION of decree" against my parents in the lower court.
We really wanted to renew the lease in lines of the original lease as per court order. But, they kept on changing the changing terms
in the draft version. This was in disagreement of the court judgement. We have documentary evidence to prove this. My father did not
know that we can push then to sign the lease by filing case of "execution of decree", otherwise we would have filed it against them.
We were told that appeal was the only way to get rid of stand-off. Our lawyer tell us that, if we accept the "execution of decree"
which they have filed against us then they will possess our land and will never vacate even at the end of the lease period. We will
be forced to file a case of eviction against the company. I can not totally deny what our lawyer is saying, because i googled cases
where the oil companies have done this thing to the owners, and an eviction case was impertinent.
Questions:
1>In Court, if we agree to "execution of decree" then what will be the future consequences? Can court push us to sign a lease having
different terms than the Original.
2) In case we accept the "execution of decree", who is going to determine the clauses of the lease renewal?
3) And what about our rent for the past 11 years. We did not receive any Rent for the past 11 years from the company.?
4) If we sign the lease and allow them to enter our land then how much difficult will it be to remove them from our land after the
lease period gets over?
Thanks
sina
(Querist) 25 June 2012
Hello,
Thanks for your help. I believe this site is the best place to get a clear understanding of the technicality of law for those who are not from law field. Can some one kindly answer my 4 questions that i posted.
Questions:
1>In Court, if we agree to "execution of decree" then what will be the future consequences? Can court push us to sign a lease having
different terms than the Original.
2) In case we accept the "execution of decree", who is going to determine the clauses of the lease renewal?
3) And what about our rent for the past 11 years. We did not receive any Rent for the past 11 years from the company.?
4) If we sign the lease and allow them to enter our land then how much difficult will it be to remove them from our land after the
lease period gets over?
Thanks again