Shakeel Qureshi & Ors. v. Rashid Qureshi & Ors., CS(COMM) 805/2026, Delhi High Court (Justice Tushar Rao Gedela), decided on 06.10.2026 | Citation: 2026:DHC:8798
Parties can agree that only the courts at one place will hear their disputes, and this binds even if another court would otherwise have jurisdiction, so long as part of the cause of action arose at the agreed place. If a suit’s reliefs depend wholly on a document containing an exclusive jurisdiction clause, the court must decide the territorial objection first, and cannot ignore the clause just because the defendant lives within its limits. A party who has not relied on the document, and who objected to jurisdiction in earlier suits, is not “approbating and reprobating.”
The Delhi High Court has returned a plaint in a family-company share dispute, holding that the “Bareilly jurisdiction” clause in the shareholders’ MoU keeps the case out of Delhi, even though one defendant lives here. Rehber Food Industries is split 50:50 between the “Rehber Group” and the “Non-Rehber Group”. A December 2022 MoU among the Rehber Group members says no one can transfer shares without the unanimous written consent of the group, and that the shares must first be offered to the group’s members. In January 2026, one Rehber member, defendant no. 3, proposed to transfer 5% of the shares to defendant no. 1, who promised to stay aligned with the group, and the plaintiffs gave conditional consent. The plaintiffs said that in June 2026 defendant no. 1 invited bids for all these shares from everyone, including the Non-Rehber Group, without offering them to the Rehber Group first. He then declared defendant no. 2 the winner at Rs 216 per share (about Rs 3.15 crore). The plaintiffs asked for an interim injunction, but the defendants said Clause 10 of the MoU subjects it to “Bareilly jurisdiction”. Justice Tushar Rao Gedela first decided this question before the injunction. He found that the plaintiffs’ reliefs were entirely based on the MoU, and rejected their plea that the defendants were contradicting themselves in earlier suits, because defendant no. 2 had not relied on the MoU and had objected to jurisdiction in the earlier suit. He accepted that Delhi would normally have jurisdiction, as defendant no. 1 lives here, but held that parties can agree to a single place, so long as part of the cause of action arose there. Here the MoU was signed in Bareilly, defendant no. 3 lives there, and the first share transfer was signed there. The transfer to defendant no. 2 depends on the first one, so the plaintiffs’ case could not succeed without challenging the first transfer, which in turn turns on the MoU. The court returned the plaint to be filed in a court with proper jurisdiction, cancelled any interim orders and expressed no opinion on the merits.