Illiterate Selangor woman wins back RM700,000 Kapar land in alleged fraud by doctor; claims friendly loan became land transfer

KUALA LUMPUR, July 17 — An illiterate Selangor woman has won back ownership of her land in Kapar within the state’s Klang district — estimated to be worth RM700,000 — which she claims was cheated away in a friendly loan gone wrong situation.

In this case, 58-year-old Kalavathi Chelliah claimed she had signed what she thought was a friendly loan agreement, only to discover later that the documents she signed had resulted in her land being transferred to her lender, and that the lender had later sold and transferred it to a company.

On Tuesday, the High Court in Shah Alam ruled in the woman’s favour, making several court orders including declarations to invalidate and cancel the transfers of land ownership from the woman to the lender in 2009, and from the lender to a company in 2018.

Yaashnipriya Baskaren, a lawyer for Kalavathi, told Malay Mail that High Court judge Datuk Faizah Jamaludin had also issued an order for the Land Office — via the Klang district land administrator — to cancel those ownership transfers and to issue a new land title in Kalavathi’s name within 30 days.

The effect of the court orders are that ownership of the land will go back to Kalavathi.

The High Court will assess or decide the amount of compensation to be paid to Kalavathi by the trio that she had sued.

On August 11, 2021, Kalavathi had filed the lawsuit against three defendants: alleged lender J who is also a doctor (second defendant); the company A which bought the land from the doctor (first defendant); and the Selangor-based lawyer P who prepared the sales and purchase agreements for the land (third defendant). She wanted to get her land back and be compensated.

Also representing Kalavathi in this case were Datuk Sivakumar Govindasamy and Lucas Liaw, while the company’s lawyer was Datin Navamani Muthayam, the alleged lender’s lawyers are Suresh Sachithanantham and Mohd Faiz Abd Rahim, and the Selangor-based lawyer sued by Kalavathi was represented by lawyer R. Thayalan.

Here’s what happened in this case, based on multiple court documents sighted by Malay Mail:

Kalavathi claimed she had in February 2008 borrowed RM110,000 (including RM8,000 of legal fees for the Selangor lawyer to prepare a friendly loan agreement) from the lender.

At the lawyer’s office where the lender was also present, Kalavathi said the lawyer had told her in Tamil that the agreement was only a formality to borrow money, and that the lawyer had obtained information about her land as a security for the loan.

Kalavathi said she had believed the lawyer and signed the February 2008 agreement as she was illiterate, but claimed that she had actually instead unknowingly signed a sales and purchase agreement and Form 14A (document to transfer ownership of property) due to alleged fraudulent actions and that the lender and lawyer had allegedly taken advantage of her illiteracy.

She said she had paid back RM55,000 in cash to the lender over 10 months from March 2008 as requested by the lender.

Kalavathi said the company A’s representative had in July 2019 visited her land — which is also where her house is located — and asked her to leave the place as it is owned by A.

Kalavathi then went to the Klang land office with a friend to check as she was not fluent in the Malay language, and found out that her land had been transferred to the lender in 2009 and then to the company in 2018 without her knowledge. She also lodged a police report over the alleged fraudulent ownership transfer of her land.

During the court case, Kalavathi’s sister had testified that the land was estimated to be worth around RM700,000.

Kalavathi is seeking compensation for alleged fraudulent misrepresentation by the doctor; alleged negligent and fraudulent misrepresentation by the lawyer; and negligent misrepresentation by the company.

But all three of them have denied her claims.

The doctor J said he had never mentioned the word “friendly loan” to Kalavathi, and claimed that she had asked him to buy the land with RM150,000 due to her financial difficulties.

J claimed he and Kalavathi had signed a sales and purchase agreement in February 2008 on the agreed terms of the RM150,000 purchase, with J claiming he had paid a RM110,000 deposit and also the remaining RM40,000 and that the property was then transferred to him in 2009.

The company A told the court that it had signed a 2014 sales and purchase agreement with J for the land, and that it had paid a total of RM600,000 for the land and that the land title was transferred to the company in 2018. (Kalavathi had suggested that the land transfer taking place in 2018 when the land transfer document Form 14A was signed in 2014 showed suspicious circumstances.)

The company also claimed it had bought the land in good faith in a genuine sales and purchase transaction.

Among other things, the lawyer P told the court that Kalavathi and J had agreed on the terms of the sales and purchase of the land without his involvement as he is only the facilitator, and claimed that he had explained the agreement’s terms to Kalavathi and that she had understood its contents before signing it voluntarily.

P also said J’s sale of the land to the company were based on terms of the sales and purchase agreement which were discussed between the two without his involvement.