B.N. SURENDRA Vs. G.A. AJIWANI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a Civil Revision Petition filed by a landlord against the decision of the Court of Small Causes in House Rent Appeal No. 272 of 1952, wherein the order of the Rent Controller refusing to evict the Petitioner's tenant was affirmed.

(2.) THE building in question is a residential building and the application for eviction was filed under Section 7(3 -A)(1) that the landlord required it for his own occupation. The defence of the tenant was that "he was engaged in an employment or class of employment notified by the State Government as an essential service" and so no order of eviction could be passed against him under Section 7(3 -A)(1). There is no dispute that the tenant was a member of the Madras Veterinary Service on the date of the application.

(3.) THE contention that the expression "engaged" in the section and in the notification in pursuance thereof means that the Government servant must be in a position actively to perform the duties of his office is, in my opinion, unsound. So far as the notification under this section is concerned, it is in these terms: