GB - Thandi v Sands & Ors

Judgment

HHJ David Cooke:

Introduction

Tarlochan Singh (also known as Tarlochan Singh Thandi) was made bankrupt by order of the Coventry County Court on 28 September 2011, on the petition of GW Deeley Ltd, a building company, in respect of monies due for building work at Tarlochan Singh's home, which is a substantial property called Prior's Croft, Gibbets Hill, Coventry. At the date of the bankruptcy Tarlochan Singh was also the registered proprietor of 16 other properties (comprised in 13 registered titles) in the Coventry area. These consisted mostly of small houses let to students, but included a site with three larger properties on the corner of Fletchamstead Highway and Kenilworth Road Coventry ("the Fletchamstead Properties").

By this application Mr Thandi, Tarlochan Singh's father, claims that he is the sole beneficial owner of all 16 properties, which he says are held on a bare trust for him. By his Points of Claim he relies on a Deed of Trust dated 8 August 2003, at the time of acquisition of the Fletchamstead Properties, which was the last of the properties to be acquired by Tarlochan Singh. In his Reply however he asserts that the properties have been his sole beneficial property "since they were purchased by him at various times between the 1980s and 2003". On that basis, Mr Curl submits the Deed of Trust did not create any new trust but merely regularised and evidenced the existing position.

Accordingly it is Mr Thandi's case that the properties never formed part of the bankruptcy estate. He seeks an order that they be transferred to him, an account of the trustees' stewardship of the properties and damages or equitable compensation arising from the trustees having

caused the legal title in the properties to be vested in themselves at a time when it is said they knew they were held on trust for Mr Thandi,

failed to transfer the titles to Mr Thandi on request,

intervened in possession proceedings taken by Nationwide Building Society as mortgagee of certain of the properties, causing Nationwide to obtain possession and/or appoint receivers over and/or sell the properties,

by these actions prevented Mr Thandi and his daughter from refinancing mortgages over some of the properties, which would have avoided possession or sale of them, and caused them to have to refinance others on unfavourable terms, and

similarly caused loss of rental income because the relevant universities and/or their student unions recommended students not to rent th