DAVY Vs. INDU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The tenant who was a defaulter in payment of arrears of rent and who faced an order of eviction on account of the above default is the Revision Petitioner in the Civil Revision Petition. The respondents who are landlords filed a petition for eviction under S.11(2)(b) and 11(3) of the Kerala Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act, 1965 (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act'). According to the landlords, the tenant was not paying the rent from 1.1.1996 onwards. Pending the trial of the petition the landlords filed IA. 455 of 1998 on 15.1.1998 under S.12 of the Act praying for a direction to the tenant to pay arrears from 1.1.1996 at the rate of Rs. 7,200/- per month till date and on failure, to stop all further proceedings and make an order directing the tenant to put the landlord in possession on failure of the deposit of arrears of rent. The Revision Petitioner filed objections to the above petition contending that the petition was not maintainable and that the rent was highly excessive and he was not legally bound to pay the same. The Rent Control Court after hearing the parties allowed the above petition as per order dated 13.7.1998 directing the Revision Petitioner to deposit the admitted arrears within four weeks from the date of the order. Thus, the Revision Petitioner had to deposit the amount on or before 11.8.1998. The Revision Petitioner did not deposit the above amount. But filed IA. 5114 of 1998 on 13.8.1998 requesting for enlargement of time to deposit the amount. The Rent Control Court found that the admitted arrears of rent had not been deposited in compliance with the order. Therefore, as per order dated 14.8.1998 an order of eviction was passed. I.A. 5114 of 1998 was dismissed on the ground that the above petition was received after the order of eviction was passed. Against the above order of the Rent Control Court the petitioner filed an appeal before the Rent Control Appellate Authority. The Rent Control Appellate Authority also dismissed the appeal. Aggrieved by these two orders the Revision Petitioner has filed this Civil Revision Petition.

(2.) The main ground which has been pressed by Sri. M.S. Narayanan, learned counsel for the petitioner is that a tenant would have to be given an opportunity to show cause as to why penal consequence contemplated by sub-s. (3) of S.12 of the Act should not be imposed even after an order under sub-s. (2) of S.12 is passed. In order to drive home the above point the learned counsel cited a number of decisions of this Court. The sheet anchor of the petitioner is the decision of the Division Bench of this Court reported in Xavier v. Leonard Pappali ( 1975 KLT 542 ). In the above case this Court held as follows:

(3.) Another Division Bench of this Court in the ruling reported in Pochappan Narayanan v. Gopalan ( 1990 (2) KLT 1 ) has considered the question in the following lines: