B CHANDRASHEKAR Vs. B VAMAN SHET

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The Court made the following : In this revision petition by the tenant the correctness and legality of the order dated 11-9-1974 in HRCA. No. 100 of 1973 of the District Judge, Mangalore, South Kanara, confirming the order dated 25-8-1973 of the Principal Munsiff, Mangalore, SK in HRC No.68 of 1971 on his file granting an order for possession in favour of Respondent-landlord under clause (h) Of the proviso to sub-sec (1) of S.21 of the Karnataka Rent Control Act, 1961, is challenged.

(2.) Respondent has his residence at No.5-742 situate in Mannagudde, Mangalore Town. In the open space in front of his residence and abutting the road he has a row of shops leaving in between them a passage of about 31/2 feet, providing the only access from the road to his residence Petitioner is in occupation as a tenant of a small shop which abuts this passage on the South. The portion to the North of the passage is stated to have been let out by respondent to a restaurateur. Respondent has sought and the Courts below have granted an order of eviction against petitioner to enable the respondent to demolish the shop premises occupied by the petitioner to provide for a passage of more width from the road to the said residence so that respondent may be able to take his car inside his compound. Petitioner's defences which assumed the familiar pattern that the petition was actuated by oblique motives to coerce an enhancement of rent and that the order of eviction would occasion greater hardship to him were not found acceptable to the Courts below. They found respondent's request both bonafide and reasonable.

(3.) Sri Krishna Bhat, learned counsel for the petitioner, is not able to make good his attack on these findings with reference either to any fallacies of reasoning or infirmities in the inferences. The Commissioner appointed in the case has stated in his report Ext.-Cl that the portion in the occupation of petitioner is the only appropriate location for widening of the passage. This report has been accepted by the Courts below. These are findings of fact and in the absence of any demonstrable errors in the approach of the Courts below to the matter, vitiating the findings, the same do not admit of interference, this Court not being a second court of first appeal. However, two other contentions advanced by Sri Krishna Bhat bear examination. He contends that a landlord cannot, consistently with the scheme of the provisions of S.21 (1) (h) read with S.25 of the Act, be permitted to seek eviction of a tenant in occupation of an accommodation so as to enable the landlord to put the premises to a use which involves, as it does in the present case, an avowed demolition of the structure. According to him, such a relief to the landlord which renders the evicted tenant's right of reentry envisaged in S.25 of the Act nugatory is opposed to and outside the pale of the said scheme. His further contention is that respondent's proposed use of the land as a mere passage after the demolition of the super structure which is now in petitioner's use is not 'occupation' within the meaning of S.21(1) (h) of the Act and that therefore relief to the landlord stands barred. There is nothing in the language of S.21(1) (h) which supports the construction Sri Krishna Bhat seeks; but his contention is that such a restriction shall have to be read into that sub-section in view of the provisions of S.25 of the Act.