MOHAMMED SALIM Vs. HABEEB AND COMPANY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner is the owner and landlord of a row of shop rooms in a building at Jew Street, Kochi City. Respondent Nos. 1, 3, 4, 5 and 6 are the petitioners tenants in occupation of different portions of the aforementioned building. The petitioner instituted RCP Nos. 30/1996, 7/1996, 71/1996, 69/1996 and 67/1996 seeking eviction of those respondents. The main and common ground urged by the petitioner in all these cases is under S.11(4)(iv) of the Kerala Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act (hereinafter referred to as the Act). There were additional eviction grounds also in two of these Rent Control Petitions. Upon service of notice by the respondents in the Rent Control Petitions, respondents 1 to 6 herein filed statement of objections before the 10th respondent to the respective Rent Control Petitions. Petitioner filed separate applications for joint trial of all the Rent Control Petitions together on the ground that petitioner wanted the same building for reconstruction and evidence to be adduced in all these cases, atlast about these aspects will be similar. The Rent Control Court by Ext. P1 common order rejected all the applications. The above order is very short. We may extract the same herein:

(2.) Aggrieved by Ext. P1 order, petitioner filed appeals under S.18 of the Act. The appellate authority held that as there is common ground under S.11(4)(iv) all these petitions can be jointly tried. The appellate authority relied on the decisions of this Court in O.P. No. 2241 of 2001, Devassia v. St. Marys Ferona Church ( 1983 KLT 172 ) and Sulthan v. Mohanan ( 2000 (3) KLT 338 ). But it dismissed the appeal as no appeal is maintainable in procedural matters in view of the decision in Thomas John v. Kochammini Amma (1991 AIR Kerala 132), Ulahannan Kurian v. Ipe Thomas ( 1985 KLT 529 ), Sumathi v. Devasan ( 1991 (1) KLT 453 ) and the decision of the Supreme Court in Shankarlal v. Shankarlal ( AIR 1965 SC 507 ). Therefore, this Writ Petition was filed under Art.227 of the Constitution of India challenging the correctness of the order of the Rent Control Authority.

(3.) When the case came up for argument, preliminary objections were raised by the respondents. The first objection raised was regarding maintainability of a petition under Art.227 of the Constitution of India. According to the petitioner, order of the Rent Control Authority was merged with the Appellate Tribunals order. Therefore, only a revision petition can be filed under S.20 of the Act and not a Writ Petition under Art.227 of the Constitution of India. Secondly it was argued that in the prayer portion only Rent Control Authoritys order is challenged. Since that order was merged with appellate order, no relief can be granted.