ANURADHA MITHAL Vs. ALOK KUMAR JAIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This petition under Section 25-B(8) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (herein-after called 'the Rent Act') has been filed by the petitioner-landlady against the order dated 09.07.10 passed by the learned Additional Rent Controller whereby the application filed by the respondent-tenant seeking leave to defend the eviction petition filed against him by her under Section 14(1)(e) of the Rent Act for his eviction from Flat No. I-101, Friends Apartments Patparganj, Delhi (hereinafter referred to as 'the tenanted premises') was allowed and he has been permitted to contest the eviction petition. The petitioner-landlady claiming herself to be the owner of the tenanted premises sought eviction of the respondent on the ground that she required the same to reside there with her daughters. It was pleaded in the eviction petition, which was filed in October, 2009, that she was residing in Meerut with her husband and one daughter. Her eldest daughter was employed in Delhi and her younger daughter was studying in Delhi. Both the daughters were staying with her grandparents in their house though the accommodation in their three rooms house was insufficient as their son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren were also living with them. The petitioner also pleaded that her third daughter, who was the youngest, was also desirous of shifting to Delhi for studying and in these circumstances, she herself also wanted to shift to Delhi to be with her daughters.

(2.) The respondent - tenant filed an application seeking leave to defend the eviction petition on many grounds. It was claimed by him that the present eviction petition had been filed after the dismissal of an earlier ejectment suit by the Civil Court on 07-09-2009 and so it was a mala fide petition. Another plea raised was that the requirement of the accommodation under his tenancy by his landlady was not bona fide also for the reason that none of her daughters was living in Delhi and both the daughters were living in Meerut and the documents placed on record by the petitioner-landlady to show that they were staying in Delhi had been obtained after the dismissal of the earlier ejectment suit to create a ground for the eviction of the respondent. It was also claimed by the respondent-tenant that in any case the accommodation for her daughters in her parents' house was sufficient petitioner's brother was staying in Ghaziabad and not with his parents in Delhi. It was further claimed by the respondent in his leave to defend application that the petitioner-landlady's requirement was not bona fide as she had no intentions to settle in Delhi since her husband was doing his business in Meerut for the last three decades.

(3.) The petitioner-landlady in her reply while maintaining that her two daughters were staying in Delhi admitted that she had filed this eviction petition after the dismissal of the earlier ejection suit which she had filed in the hope that she would succeed in that civil suit (In this petition it is being claimed now by her that earlier suit was filed since before the expiry of period often years from the date of the construction of the tenanted premises in question eviction petition under the Rent Act could not be filed).