BRAHADAMBAL AND ORS. Vs. SRI SWAYAMBUNATHASWAMI DEVASTHANAM REPRESENTED BY ITS HEREDITARY TRUSTEE SRI LA SRI SHANMUGHA DESIKA GNANA SAMBANDA PANDARA SANNADHI AVERGAL ADHEENAKARTHA OF DHARMAPURAM MUTT AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ALL the above cases arise out of the suits filed by the respondent Devasthanam for the recovery of arrears of rent from the various tenants as per the lease deeds executed by them. The Devasthanam succeeded in getting a decree for arrears of rent claimed in the lower appellate Court, which overruled the contention of the tenants that the rent payable should be taken to be the fair rent and not at the contract rate.

(2.) WHEN the above cases were pending in this Court, Madras Act XXI of 1972 came into force on 11th August, 1972. Section 3of that Act conferred certain benefits on the tenants. It provided that, if a tenant deposits the whole of the current rent within six months from the publication of that Act in the Court, or before the competent authority, he shall be deemed to have paid or deposited all the arrears of rent outstanding on 30th June, 1971. Taking advantage of the said provision, the tenants in all those cases have deposited the whole of the current rent in respect of their tenancies with the Devasthanam in the Revenue Court and the Revenue Court had accepted such deposits. At the time of the hearing of these cases, Mr. T. R. Srinivasan, the learned Counsel for the tenants, brought to my notice the factum of deposit of the current rent by the tenants in the Revenue Court and submitted that, in view of the said deposit of the current rent by all these tenants, these cases have to be allowed and the decrees of the lower appellate Court have to be set aside in entirety.

(3.) MR . M. S. Venkatarama Iyer, the learned Counsel for the respondent -Devasthanam, however, contends that, even though the tenants have deposited the current rent in the Revenue Court, that will not entitle them to have the decrees of the lower appellate Court set aside in entirety, but that they will be entitled to have only that portion of the decrees, which relate to the arrears of tent, set aside or cancelled, and not the entire decrees. According to the learned Counsel the decree for costs cannot be set aside and the tenants cannot get over their liability for costs in cases where the decrees have been obtained even, before the commencement of this Act, and the position has been made clear by the provisions of Section 3 (3) of the Act, which specifically states that, if, before the date of the publication of that Act, any decree or order has been passed in any suit or proceeding for the recovery of any arrears of rent, the Court or the competent authority shall, on the application of the cultivating tenant who pays or deposits the whole of the current rent, vacate the decree or order in so far as such decree or order relates to the recovery of the rent. It is stated that the intention of the legislature is made quite plain when it said that the decree has to be vacated in so far as it relates to the arrears of rent. The learned Counsel also points out the distinction made by the legislature between a suit or proceeding pending on the date of the publication of the Act and a suit or proceeding in which a decree or order has been passed before the date of the publication of the Act, that, while Section 3 (2) states that in any suit or proceeding pending on the date of the publication of the Act, if the tenant deposits the whole of the current rent, the suit shall be dismissed without costs, Section 3 (3) dealing with suits or proceedings in which decrees or orders have been passed before the date of the publication of the Act, directs the decree to be vacated only as regards the amount of the rent claimed. The learned Counsel for the respondent says that if the intention of the legislature were to be otherwise, it would have made a similar provision in Section 3 (3) for not awarding costs, as has been done in Section 3 (2).