GULAM MOHAMOOD Vs. AMMANI AMMAL (DECEASED) AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE are related appeals by the plaintiff and the defendants respectively in a suit for recovery of arrears of rent, damages for use and occupation and possession through ejectment. The suit was decreed with costs as prayed for The plaintiff (landlord) purports to be aggrieved by the decree which is not in respect of the entire land according to the plaint schedule, but is specifically limited to the 5 or 6 huts thereon occupied by the defendants. The defendants (tenants) claimed to be aggrieved by the decree in ejectment, which totally ignores the provisions of the Madras City Tenants' Protection Act (Act III of 1922 as modified by Act XIX of 1955) and particularly the rights given to tenants under Sections 3 and 11 of that Act. These related appeals thus raise the following issues : (i) whether the Madras City Tenants' Protection Act, 1921 (Act III of 1922) applies to the present case, either as it stood, or as amended by Madras Act XIX of 1955; (ii) whether, if the Act is applicable, the decree in, ejectment can be supported, when the landlord admittedly failed to comply with the provisions of Section 11 of the Act, and when Section 3 of the Act has also not been complied with; (iii) whether the fact that the tenants preferred I.A. No. 124 of 1956 under Section 9 of the Act for exercising the option to purchase the land, which was dismissed by the Court below on the ground of limitation, amounts to any waiver by the tenants of the requirements of Section 11, upon the authority of Vedachala Naicker v. Doraiswarni Mudaliar, (1950) 1 M.L.J. 32 and (iv) whether, assuming that the suit ought not to have been decreed for ejectment the portion of the decree which relates to the claim for arrears of rent ought to be sustained, and what further observations should be now made concerning the mutual rights of parties?

(2.) IN the interests of justice I am constrained to observe that the trial of this suit by the learned Additional Judge of the City Civil Court, appears to have been both hasty and superficial. The learned Judge does not find that the Madras City Tenants Protection Act, 1921 (Madras Act III of 1922) as modified by Madras Act XIX of 1955, does not apply to the facts of this case, or to the parties. But he seems to hold, as far as I can follow him, that since the defendants denied the tenancy in their written statement and set up an independent title perfected by adverse possession, they should be held to have forfeited their rights under Section 111(g) of the Transfer of Property Act. I shall quote the authorities on this aspect later, but two broad propositions must suffice to dispose of this reasoning, which is fallacious. Firstly, the defendants admitted the tenancy at the trial, as the learned Judge explicitly finds, and even filed I.A. No. 124 of 1956 for reliefs under Section 9 of the Act, as acknowledged tenants. Secondly, the law is very clear that for Section 111(g) of the Transfer of Property Act to operate, the forfeiture alleged must have occurred prior to the suit, so that it would be part of the cause of action upon which the suit was based. The authorities are very clear that a denial of the tenancy after the suit is instituted, would not work out as any such forfeiture of the lease under section 111(g) of the Transfer of Property Act. Further, as I have observed, the repudiation of the tenancy by the defendants in the written statement was not adhered to at the trial, and the defendants expressly acknowledged the tenancy and claimed the protection of the City Tenants' Protection Act, Madras Act III of 1922, as amended by Madras Act XIX of1955. Therefore, the fact that the notice issued in this case (Exhibit A -i, dated 27th July, 1954) admittedly ignores the provisions of Section 11 of the Act does, according to all the authorities, render the suit in ejectment liable to be dismissed.

(3.) IN Mulla's Transfer of Property Act, 1956 Edition, at page 688, the learned author observes with reference to Section 111(g):