SHANTI DEVI MEHRA Vs. VINOD KUMAR JAIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India has been preferred to challenge the order dated 05. 09. 2006, passed by the Additional Rent control Tribunal (ARCT), Delhi in RCA No. 623/2003, filed by the respondent-landlord. The said appeal had been preferred by the respondent-landlord on account of the dismissal of the eviction petition filed by him against the petitioner herein on the ground of subletting of the tenanted premises by the petitioner herein in favour of one Ashok Kumar. By the impugned order, the learned ARCT has allowed the application filed under Order 41 Rule 27 CPC by the respondent-landlord subject to costs of Rs. 3000/- and remanded the matter back to the trial Court with the direction to redecide the same after permitting the respondent herein to produce the witnesses in terms of Order 41 Rule 27 CPC within three months, after giving an opportunity, to the petitioner herein also to rebut the evidence.

(2.) THE case of the respondent-landlord was that the premises had been let out to smt. Shanti Devi Mehra, the petitioner herein, and that she in turn sublet the same to Sh. Vinod Kumar Jain, who was carrying out his business under the name and style of M/s Ashoka Agencies. Before the Rent Controller one of the witnesses summoned by the respondent-landlord for M/s Pearl Drinks Limited i. e. PW-5 had stated on oath that they supplied soft drinks to M/s Ashoka Agencies, a proprietorship concern of Smt. Shanti Devi, the petitioner. The case of the petitioner is that Ashok Kumar is an employee of the petitioner, who is an old lady. Due to the aforesaid testimony of PW-5, the eviction petition had been dismissed. During the pendency of the aforesaid appeal before the learned ARCT, the respondent filed the application under Order 41 Rule 27 CPC and submitted that the respondent had filed an injunction suit against the petitioner herein and in those proceedings certain records had been summoned by the respondent-landlord from which it transpired that Ashok Kumar was running the business of selling of cold drinks in a portion of the suit premises. It was further claimed that the respondent had come to learn the bank accounts being operated by Ashok Kumar showing the address of the suit premises, in which the amounts received by him from the business of M/s Ashoka Agency was being credited and payments were being made from the said amount in relation to the business of cold drinks. The learned ARCT allowed the aforesaid application. Paragraphs 7 and 8 of the impugned order are relevant and read as follows: -

(3.) BEFORE me it is submitted by learned counsel for the petitioner, by relying upon the decision of the Supreme Court in "municipal Corporation of Greater bombay Vs. Lala Pancham" AIR 1965 SC 1008 that the respondent-landlord could not have been permitted to lead additional evidence to merely fill up the lacunas in the evidence led by him and the retrial could not have been ordered under the garb of leading additional evidence. He submits that the evidence that was available on record was sufficient to enable the Court to pronounce judgment. Order 41 Rule 27 CPC does not entitle the appellate Court to permit any fresh evidence to be led in only for the purpose of pronouncing judgment in a particular way. He relies on the following observations of the Supreme Court from the said decision:-