ANANTHASUBRAMANIA IYER Vs. SARADA AMMA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The revision petitioner had 5 or 6 vegetable shops in different parts of Trivandrum. His business failed. He then surrendered possession of all the rooms in which the said shops were run except the one owned by the respondent herein. He was not carrying on any business in this room from the beginning of May to December 18th, 1975 on which date the respondent applied to the Rent Control Court to evict him on the ground that he ceased to occupy the building continuously for six months without reasonable cause. The Appellate Authority and Revisional Court agreed in holding that he failed to substantiate his case that he was ill during May to August end and that thereafter the respondent obstructed him from doing business in the room in question in so far as there is no evidence in that behalf except that of the revision petitioner. This is a finding of fact and is, therefore, beyond challenge in this Court.

(2.) It is contended that as held by the Rent Control Court the revision petitioner must beheld to be occupying the room in question though he was physically absent therefrom for a continuous period of six months since be has the intention to possess and occupy the same. The learned counsel for the revision petitioner relied on Wigley v. Leigh 1950 (2) K.B. 305 C.A The facts of that case reveal that a caretaker was installed to look after the building, that he kept if ready for occupation at any time and that the evidence made it clear that Mrs. Leigh, the statutory tenant, intended to return there to live when her health improved, though after leaving England in 1945 because of pulmonary tuberculosis and on medical advice, she had resided in the house only once, for three months in the summer of 1947. Therefore it was held that she was in occupation of the house as a statutory tenant. This case is an instance of the application of the formula, animus possidendi and corpus possessions, evolved and used by Asquith L. J. in Brown v. Brash 1948 (1) A.E.R. 922 C.A. There Lord Asquith said :

(3.) S.11(4)(v) of the Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act, 1965 enables a landlord to evict a tenant 'if the tenant ceases to occupy the building continuously for six months without reasonable cause'. Under this provision the tenant removing his physical presence from the building during intermittent periods less than six months in duration will not rouse the presumption of his occupation of the building and the provision, thus recognizes the fact that law does not expect that the tenant should be under the roof of his rented building all the 24 hours of the day and all the 365 days in the year. However, his physical absence therefrom continuously for six months will arouse the presumption that he has ceased to occupy the building and that he has abandoned it. Once this presumption arises the onus is on the tenant to dislodge the same by establishing his de facto intention to possess it for the purposes for which it is let to him and also, facts constituting outward expression of the intention of possession in fact, (for what matters so far as statutory tenancy is concerned is, in the words of Asquith L. J. in the Brown case, possession in fact and not possession in law) so that despite the physical absence of the tenant from the building continuously for six months or more, the Court is satisfied that he is occupying the building by retaining possession infact thereof. This I suppose is the sense in which the expression: 'without reasonable cause', is used in S.11(4)(v) of the Act The burden of proving 'reasonable cause' for non occupation of the building continuously for six months is on the tenant, and 'reasonable cause' would only be such cause as would enable the Court to come to the conclusion that the tenant has not abandoned the premises and that he still retains de facto possession of the same though he is not physically present thereon.