Question

What steps are involved before a mortgagee may exercise its power of sale? With reference to the leading cases on a mortgagee’s responsibilities when exercising the power of sale, discuss the tests favoured by both English and Australian courts. Which test do you favour, and why?

Answer 1

This power of sale, a feature of the English mortgage was originally confined to Englishmen or to Indian residents in the Presidency Towns who were conversant with the forms of English mortgage and English law and procedure as administered in the Presidency Towns. In the mofussil, prior to the Transfer of Property Act, there were certain regulations governing the law of mortgages between the parties who were not Europeans. Those regulations did not empower the mortgagee to effect sale of the mortgaged property without the intervention of the court.

Section 69 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882, was modelled on the English Conveyancing Act, 1881 and the English Law of Property Act, 1925. Section 69 was later remodelled by amending Act 20 of 1929 drawing the principles from the English law.

Section 69 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882 contains five sub-sections. Sub-sections (1) and (2) as detailed hereunder, deal with the circumstances under which the mortgagee's right to exercise the power of sale without the intervention of the court arises. Sub-sections (3) and (4) respectively dwell on the title of the purchaser from the mortgagee and the manner of deployment of sale proceeds of the mortgaged property by the mortgagee, his duties and responsibilities. Sub-section (5) states that nothing in this section applies to powers conferred before the first day of July, 1882.

The right under Section 69 is as much and as full a right as the right of redemption of the mortgagor. The mortgagee is, in no sense, a trustee for the mortgagor in the matter of the power of sale; as he holds it for protection of his interest and for his benefit. The mortgagee is not debarred from exercising the power of sale, even though the mortgagor files a suit for redemption. So long as the mortgage money is not paid or validly tendered, the mortgagee with full knowledge of a pending suit for redemption and even to defeat the suit can enforce his power of sale under this section.

While clauses (b) and (c) of sub-section (1) require that power of sale without intervention of the court must be expressly conferred on the mortgagee by the mortgage deed, no such conditions need be fulfilled, where the mortgage is an English mortgage and neither of the parties is Hindu, Mohammedan or Buddhist or any sect, race etc., as stipulated under clause (a) of sub-section (1).