GNANAPRAKASAN AND ANR. Vs. MAHBOOB BI AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE Revision Petitions arise out of proceedings under the Madras City Tenants' Protection Act under the following circumstances. In suits in ejectment filed by the landlord, the tenants applied under Section 9 of the above Act, and prayed for an order of Court to direct the landlord to sell the land for a price to be fixed by the Court. The Court accordingly appointed a Commissioner, who has valued the land and directed the payment of the price in instalments. Under the Act as it stood at the relevant time, there was no provision for an appeal against an order of the Court fixing the price. The landlord -respondent thereupon filed these Revision Petitions principally questioning the valuation fixed by the Court. While these Revision Petitions were pending before this Court, the Madras City Tenants' Protection Act was amended by Act (XIII of 1960), whereby certain important amendments were carried out in certain Sections of the Act. Section 9 -A was introduced providing for an appeal from an order passed by a Court under Section 9 of the Act. Section 9 itself was amended in the following particulars. While under the provision as it stood formerly the Court had to fix the price according to the lowest market value prevalent within seven years preceding the date of order, the amendment, made a variation in this regard. It directed that the Court shall fix the price of the minimum extent of land decided as aforesaid or of the extent of land specified in the application under Clause (a) whichever is less. While previously the entire extent of the land of which the tenant was in occupation was to be sold to him by an order under Section 9, the amendment provided that the Court could direct the sale of either the whole or part of the land specified in the application. The Court was thus called upon to decide the minimum extent of the land necessary for the convenient enjoyment of the tenant. Notwithstanding that the tenant was in occupation of a larger extent of land, if the Court found that a smaller extent would be sufficient for the convenient enjoyment of the tenant, the Court could order the sale by the landlord to the tenant of only such smaller extent. With regard to the price also, while the Act previously directed that the minimum of the price during the previous seven years was to be taken, the amended Act stipulated that the price shall be the average market value of the three years immediately preceding the date of the order. The principal contention of the landlord in the present case is accordingly that under the conditions now set down by the amended Act, the Court has to decide two matters : firstly, determine the minimum extent of land which the tenant could be granted a sale of, and secondly, fix the price of that land in accordance with the new formula contained in the Act. On the date when these petitions were filed, the new Act had not come into force and the Revision Petitions accordingly confined themselves to questioning the correctness of the order of the lower Court in fixing the price. The grounds taken in the petitions related to the evidence on record which it was claimed had not been properly considered by the lower Court in arriving at the value to be fixed according to the Act as it stood. But, by the time these petitions came on for hearing, the Act had been amended and the arguments before me have proceeded on the basis that since these eviction petitions are pending, the Court should now proceed in accordance with the principles laid down in the new Act. The tenants object to the application of the new Act contending that the new Act cannot be regarded as retrospective in respect of the matters which are now sought to be canvassed and that certain valuable rights which were created in the tenants under the old Act are by the interpretation placed upon the provisions of the Act by the landlord sought to be taken away; and it is contended that the new Act should not be regarded as retrospective for that reason.

(2.) I shall now proceed to examine these contentions. The first contention on behalf of the tenants is that the proceedings before the lower Court cannot be deemed to be pending, since an order directing the payment of the value of the land has been made and it only remained for the landlord to execute the sale -deed in compliance with the directions of the Court. It may however be mentioned that in some of these petitions some more instalments of the value of the land still remain to be paid, while in one of the petitions, that the entire amount has been paid but final orders in the matters have not been passed. Under Section 9 of the Act, the procedure set down is that after the Court passes an order directing the payment of instalments of the price of the land as fixed, the matter does not automatically come to an end. On the payment of the price so fixed, the Court has to pass an order directing the conveyance by the landlord to the tenant of the extent of the land for which the price was fixed, and the Court has also by the same order to make arrangements for placing the one party or the other in possession of the land. There is the further condition that if the tenant failed to make the payments as directed, the application of the tenant could be dismissed with a consequent order of the repayment to him of the part of the purchase price paid, by him. It is obvious therefore that the mere circumstance that the Court has made an order fixing the price of the land and directed its payment by the tenant does not put an end to the petition. The question however is whether in the absence of any provision in the Act for carrying the matter in Appeal or in Revision, it could still be regarded as a pending proceedings and. by reason of that pendency, the Amending Act could be made applicable to those proceedings.

(3.) ON behalf of the petitioner -landlord, reliance has also been placed upon Satyanarayana v. Venkatarattamma : AIR1951Mad1044 . In that case, the question arose whether an appeal preferred to the Appellate Tribunal under the Madras Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act must be deemed to be pending so long as the application to quash the proceedings was pending in the High Court. An application for a writ of certiorari for setting aside the order of the Subordinate Judge, the Appellate Authority under the Act, had been filed in the High Court. The order in eviction was based on the ground of default. But the Act had been amended providing that a default should be wilful before an order in eviction could be based thereon. The contention that was raised then was that because the original application for eviction as well as the Appeal preferred against that order were disposed, of long before the amendment came into force, the application for a writ of certiorari could not be regarded as a proceeding instituted under that Act. The learned Judges found considerable force in this argument. While conceding that the Act provided for an appeal but did not provide for any further proceeding by way of revision or certiorari under the Act, they nevertheless went on to hold that the moment a proceeding was instituted in the High Court, it should necessarily follow that the decision in Appeal was again set at large as it lost the finality the moment the High Court issued the rule Nisi and on this ground they held that the proceedings were pending and that the amended Act would apply.