P RAJU Vs. BALAKRISHNAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE plaintiff is the appellant. He is the tenant under the defendant in respect of one room bearing shop No. 2 in premises No. 61 Arappalayam Cross Road, madurai town. The landlord was using the remaining building for the purpose of his business as also his residence. He filed a petition under Sections 10 (2) (i)and 10 (3) (c) of the Madras Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act, 18 of 1960, for eviction of the tenant on 3-4-1968 and this was numbered as R. C. O. P. 273 of 1968 on the file of the District Munsif Court, Madurai town, who was the rent Controller. The two grounds on which the petition for eviction was sought for are willful default in the payment of rent falling under Section 10 (2) (i) and bona fide requirement of additional accommodation for the landlord's occupation for carrying on his business falling under Section 10 (3) (c ). It does not appear that a counter-statement was filed by the tenant in R. C. O. P. No. 273 of 1968. At any rate, there is no evidence in these proceedings that any such statement was filed by the tenant. On 19-7-1969 the parties made a joint endorsement on the petition for eviction which read as follows -" the respondent submits to an order of eviction provided he is granted four years from today for vacating. Respondent to draw the sum of Rs. 100/- deposited by him into Court. There are no petition mentioned arrears. The respondent will not press the fair rent application. The respondent will pay the rent at Rs. 40/ -. Respondent contends that there are no arrears. " on this joint endorsement, the Rent Controller made the following order on the same date: 1. That the respondent do put the petitioner in possession of the petition mentioned building within the period of four years from the date; and 2. That there be no order as to costs. " The tenant did not deliver possession on the 19th July 1973, as agreed to by him in the joint endorsement; but filed the present suit for a declaration that the order of eviction in R. C. O. P. 273 of 1968 was made without jurisdiction and, therefore, it is void ab initio and unenforceable. The plaintiff also prayed for consequential injunction restraining the defendant-landlord from executing the decree or otherwise interfering with his possession and enjoyment. The trial Court decreed the suit holding that the Rent Controller had not exercised his mind and given a finding On the existence of the grounds for eviction and that the order of eviction was made simply on the basis of the joint endorsement made by the parties and that there was no other materials except the joint endorsement for ordering eviction. Therefore, the order of eviction was held to be null and void. The trial court relied on certain portions in the judgment in K. K. Chari v. R. M. Seshadri, in support of these findings and also held that the landlord in this case did not come within the exception pointed out in that case. On appeal by the defendant, the lower appellate Court held that though the order ex facie does not show that the Rent Controller was satisfied that the requirements of the landlord are bona fide, the fact that the tenant did not defend the petition coupled with the fact of submitting to an order of eviction clearly showed that he accepted as true the claim of the landlord that he required the premises bona fide for his own occupation. This amounted to the acceptance by the Rent Controller that the landlord had made out the statutory requirement entitling him to ask for possession of the premises for owner's occupation and that, therefore, under the decision in K. K. Charj v. R. M. Seshadri, itself the order of eviction was valid and, therefore, the suit was liable to be dismissed. I may add that on the question of willful default, the lower appellate Court also came to the conclusion concurring with the trial Court that the joint endorsement showed that there was no willful default in the payment of rent. In the view that under Section 10 (3) (c) of the Act the landlord was entitled to an order for eviction and the order of eviction made by the rent Controller was valid, the appeal was allowed and the suit dismissed.

(2.) IN this second appeal, the learned counsel for the appellant contended that the finding of the lower appellate Court that the Rent controller was satisfied as to the bona fide requirement of the landlord for additional accommodation for the purpose of business is not borne out either by the order of the Rent Controller or the joint endorsement made by the parties and that, therefore, squarely on the ratio of the judgments of the Supreme Court in Kausalya Devi v. K L. Eansal, Feorozilal v. Manmal, K. K. Chari v. R. M. Seshadri, and Nagindas v. Dalpatram, , the order of the Rent Controller was void and unenforceable.

(3.) IN the first two cases, the Supreme Court held with reference to the provisions in Delhi and Ajmer Rent Control Act, 38 of 1952, that the jurisdiction of the Rent Controller to pass a decree for recovery of possession of any premises depends upon his satisfaction that one or more of the grounds mentioned in Section 13 (i) of that Act have been proved. Where the Rent controller had proceeded solely on the basis of the compromise arrived at between the parties, it was not competent for him to order eviction and the decree for eviction made on the basis of such compromise alone was a nullity. In these two decisions, the ratio of the judgment of the Supreme Court in an earlier reported decision in Bahadur Singh v. Muni Subrat Das, (1969) 2 SCR 432 was followed. The majority judgment in K. K. Chari v. R. M. Seshadri, while approving and following the principle laid down in the earlier two cases, held that the satisfaction of the Rent Controller of the existence of the grounds of eviction might be gathered either from the order made by the Rent Controller or from other materials on record which showed the existence of such grounds which could have satisfied the Rent Controller. In the words of the Supreme Court (at p. 1320)