POPATBHAI DAMAJIBHAI SOLANKI Vs. CHUNILAL RAMJIBHAI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Tenant " original defendant in H.R.P.C.S. No.1762 of 1996 is before this court against decree of eviction, which was passed against him by the learned Judge of the trial Court on all three grounds, namely, tenant is in arrears, Landlord has bona fide requirement of the premises and that the tenant has acquired suitable accommodation, was confirmed by the Appellate Bench of the Small Causes Court, Ahmedabad in Civil Appeal No.58 of 2002 on the ground of tenant being in arrears whereas the other two grounds were not believed by the Appellate Bench.

(2.) Mr. D.V. Shah, the learned advocate appearing for the petitioner " tenant invited the attention of this court to relevant discussions in para 8, 9 of the learned trial Judge on the point of tenant being in arrears. The learned advocate strenuously submitted that the court below has committed an error in holding that the tenant is in arrears of rent. He submitted that when the learned trial Judge has raised an issue of "standard rent" and decided the same while deciding the suit, the learned Judge could not have held that the tenant was in arrears. He submitted that after determining the standard rent in the judgment itself, the learned Judge ought to have granted time to the tenant to deposit the arrears if any. Mr. Shelat, the learned advocate appearing for the respondent herein " the landlord " the original plaintiff submitted that the defendant " tenant has filed written statement which is at Exh-10 and in para 5 of the said written statement, the defendant " tenant admitted that the contractual rent of the premises was Rs.50/-, the tenant has not said a word about the rent being exorbitant and not being the standard rent of the premises. He further submitted that, the only dispute raised by the defendant is that the said rent included all taxes and that the liability to pay tax was on the landlord, whereas the electric burning was to be borne by the tenant. The learned advocate Mr. Shelat submitted that when there was no dispute of the standard rent, even if the issue of standard rent was raised, that would not help the tenant. The liability to pay the rent regularly and not to be in arrears persisted. He submitted that the learned Judge has rightly held that the tenant was in arrears and passed the decree on that ground, which is erroneously reversed by the learned Appellate Bench.

(3.) The learned advocate appearing for the petitioner " tenant invited the attention to the calculation part of the arrears. The learned advocate submitted that the learned trial Judge has finally come to the conclusion that the tenant was in arrears to the tune of Rs.400/-. The said finding does not warrant an interference in light of the submissions made hereinabove. The submissions made by the learned advocate for the petitioner that the standard rent was fixed for the first time at the time of final adjudication of the suit, after which the learned Judge did not grant any time to deposit the arrears if any do not warrant an acceptance by this court. The learned advocate for the petitioner submitted that if the learned trial Jude had taken that trouble, the learned Judge would not have fallen into an error of holding that the tenant is in arrears and would not have passed an eviction decree on that ground.