ASHA LATA PANDEY Vs. BRAHAM PAL SINGH YADAV

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present petition impugns an order of 31st May, 2013 whereby the petitioner's eviction petition before the Rent Controller was dismissed. Facts:

(2.) The petitioner along with her late husband had filed a petition under Section 14(1)(e) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (for short "the Act") seeking eviction of the respondent from the suit premises bearing No. R-157, Gali No. 8, Ramesh Park, Laxmi Nagar, Delhi-92. The grounds for revision petition are that there has been a miscarriage of justice; that suit property was required bona fide for her family and there is no other suitable accommodation available; the eviction petition does not abate on the death of one of the petitioners and the cause of action regarding bona fide requirement survives; that the Rent Controller failed to exercise jurisdiction vested in him and acted with material irregularity and finally, that the expression of "requirement of premises" by the landlord ought to be assigned a wider liberal meaning in view of the judgment of the Supreme Court in Joginder Pal v. Naval Kishore, 2002 AIR(SC) 2256 In the same vein, counsel for the petitioner also relied upon the judgment of this Court in Harish Kumar v. Krishna,2013 4 CLJ 107 Delhi to contend that family cannot be confined to only one person. The suit premises were said to be required bonafidely on the ground that petitioner No. 1, one of the owners, needed it for starting his own business. In other words, the eviction was sought specifically for the petitioner No.1 i.e. Rajesh Kumar Pandey. He passed away on 12th December, 2012. The Trial Court dismissed the eviction petition on 13.05.2013 on the ground that the petitioners were unable to prove that they did not have any other reasonably suitable accommodation. The appeal preferred against his dismissal was also dismissed on 16.12.2013. This petition seeks the setting aside of only the order of 31.05.2013

(3.) The ground of challenge before the Rent Controller and before this Court primarily is whether the petition would abate with the passing away of one of the petitioners when eviction is sought on the basis of bona fide requirement under Section 14(1)(e) of the Act. The Rent Controller dismissed the eviction petition on the ground that since the person for whom specifically the premises were required had expired, the need also extinguished with him; and that the petitioners had not proved that there was no other reasonable suitable alternate accommodation available with them.