SIVAPRAKASA KRISHNASWAMI GURUKKAL Vs. KANDAPPA GOUNDAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This civil revision petition has come before us as Alagiriswami J., who hard it in the first instance, found some difficulty in agreeing with the decision of Kailasam J., in Nallathambi v/s. Nagaratnasami Devastanam,, ILR (1965) 2 Mad 225 particularly in view of the decision of the Privy Council in Hansraj Gupta v/s. Official Liquidators of Dehra Dun etc. Co. . The civil revision petition raises an important question, whether a revenue Court has jurisdiction in an application for eviction by a landlord to direct a cultivation tenant u/S. 3(4)(b) of the Madras Cultivating Tenants Protection Act 1955, to deposit the entire arrears of rent, irrespective of the fact that part of it may be time -barred and cannot be recovered in a suit for arrears of rent in a civil Court.

(2.) In the decision in, ILR (1965) 2 Mad 225, Kailasam J. has referred to the several clauses of Sec. 3 of the Madras Cultivating Tenants Protection Act 1955 hereinafter referred to as the Act, and found that in the absence of any provision restricting the arrears of rent of three years prior to the date of the application, there is no justification for holding that the arrears of rent which the revenue Court could direct the tenant to pay or deposit shall be confined to the said period.

(3.) The scheme of Sec. 3 of the Act, as revealed from the several clauses found therein, also furnishes some guidance to answer the question involved in this civil revision petition. Sub -section (1) of Sec. 3 of the Act provides that "no cultivating tenant shall be evicted from his holding or any part thereof by or at the instance of his landlord, whether in execution of a decree or order of a Court or otherwise", except in accordance with the provisions of the succeeding sub -sections. Sub -section (2) of the Sec. 3 of the Act provides that subject to the next succeeding sub -section, namely sub -section (3), cultivating tenants falling under that sub -section cannot claim the exemption from eviction conferred on cultivating tenants under Sec. 3(1) of the Act. One of such cultivating tenants is one who defaults to pay rent prior to, or after the commencement of the Act.