PIARA LAL Vs. KEWAL KRISHAN CHOPRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) What falls for consideration in this appeal by special leave by a tenant against the judgment of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana in a Civil Revision is whether the High Court had transgressed its revisional powers in interfering with the concurrent findings rendered by the Rent Controller and the Appellate Authority and ordering the eviction of the appellant herein from the leased premises and secondly whether the High Court had erred in holding that the leased premises had become unsafe and unfit for human habitation as envisaged in S. 13(3)(a)(iii), East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949 (hereinafter the Act).

(2.) The respondent's petition for eviction was originally based on other grounds such as bona fide requirement of the premises for own use and change of user of the premises by the tenant. As he failed before the Rent Controller, the respondent preferred an appeal and during the pendency of the appeal he obtained orders and amended the petition and raised an additional ground under S.13(3)(a)(iii) for seeking the eviction of the appellant viz. the leased premises had become unsafe and unfit for human habitation. The Appellate Authority called for a finding on the additional ground from the Rent Controller and the finding went against the respondent. The Appellate Authority concurred with the Rent Controller on the said finding and dismissed the appeal. Before the Appellate Authority the respondent did not seriously press the original grounds on which eviction was sought for and laid stress only upon the ground under S. 13(3)(a)(hi) of the Act. The respondent then preferred a Civil Revision wherein the High Court sustained his case and ordered the eviction of the appellant under S. 13(3)(a)(iii) and hence the present appeal by the appellant-tenant.

(3.) Section 13(3)(a)(iii) was resorted to for seeking eviction of the tenant on the footing that one room in the rear side of the leased premises had fallen down. We may state, even at this juncture that the High Court had wrongly assumed that besides the falling down of the roof, one of the walls had also crumbled. This assumption was a mistaken one because the expert witnesses examined during the trial by the parties have spoken about the good condition of three walls alone of the room and not the fourth because they are the outer walls of the room while the fourth wall was a common wall for the room in question and the adjoining room and hence there was no need to certify its good condition. It was therefore wrong for the High Court to have assumed that only three walls of the room were in good condition and not the fourth wall.