Partnership asset shares are not specific immovable property, so a dissolution and relinquishment document need not be compulsorily registered.

A partner's interest in partnership assets is a right to a share in the net realised assets on dissolution, not an interest in any specific immovable property during the subsistence of the firm. A document merely recording dissolution and relinquishment of partnership rights, without expressly conveying identifiable immovable property, does not operate as an instrument transferring immovable property and is not compulsorily registrable under the Registration Act. On that basis, the unregistered document was admissible.

---

---

Issues: Whether the interest of a partner in partnership assets, including immovable property, is to be treated as movable or immovable property for the purposes of section 17(1)(c) of the Registration Act, 1908, and whether an unregistered document recording dissolution and relinquishment of partnership rights is compulsorily registrable.

Analysis: Under the Indian Partnership Act, partnership property is treated as property of the firm, and a partner has no exclusive right to any specific item of partnership assets during the subsistence of the partnership. The partner's entitlement is to a share of profits while the firm subsists and, upon dissolution, to a share in the net assets after liabilities are discharged under the statutory scheme for settlement of accounts. This makes the partner's share a right to receive a proportion of the realised partnership assets, not an interest in any specific immovable property. A document recording that the partnership has ended and that one group of partners has given up its share in the business and assets, without expressly conveying any specific immovable property, does not by itself operate as an instrument transferring immovable property.

Conclusion: The partner's interest in the partnership assets was not an interest in specific immovable property requiring compulsory registration under section 17(1)(c) of the Registration Act, 1908. The unregistered document was admissible, and the appeal failed.

---