SUDARSAN TRADING CO LTD Vs. L DSOUZA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Appellant, M/s Sudarshan Trading Company Limited, is aggrieved by the judgment and decree dt. 19.4.1963 made in O.S. No. 3091 of 1980, on the file of the 10th Addl., City Civil Judge, Bangalore, decreeing the respondent-plaintiff's suit for ejectment and granting an order for possession. This appeal is in the list of admission cases. It is admitted and with the consent of learned Counsel on both sides taken up for final hearing, and disposed of by this judgment.

(2.) Respondent, Mrs.L.D'Souza, is the owner of premises No.11, C.J. D'Souza Road, Civil Station, Bangalore and appellant is the tenant. Letting is for non-residential purposes. On 26.12.1974, after an earlier lease for 3 years had come to an end, a fresh lease deed dt. 26.12.1974, Ext.P.1, was entered into between the parties. The term mentioned in Ext.P.1 was three years from 1.8.1974. Rent was Rs. 2,300 per month. The period of 3 years under Ext.P.1 having run-out, Respondent issued notice Ext.P.2 dated 7/10/1977 telling, appellant that she did not desire to renew the lease and that the tenancy stood terminated and called upon the appellant to quit and deliver vacant possession on the expiry of 31/10/1977. This notice stood unreplied. Some eight months thereafter, on 1/6/1978, the present suit for ejectment was instituted. In para 4 of plaint it was stated that the lease came into an end on 31.7.1977 by efflux of time and that thereafter "the tenancy in respect of the said premises became a month to month tenancy.

(3.) Appellant denied that after the expiry of the lease there was any month to month tenancy by holding over. It was contended that the parties had really agreed upon a ten year lease from 1972 and that though Ext. P.1 mentioned only three years, it was just a partial effectuation of the agreement between the parties, being merely the manner in which the agreement for a ten year lease was to be implemented from time to time. The appellant, accordingly, contended that its continuance in possession was referrable to, and in part performance of, the alleged agreement for a ten year lease, which, according to the appellant, would "last up to July 1982". In regard to the validity of the notice, Ext.P.2, it was urged: