RAMPUR ENGINEERING CO LTD Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a plaintiff's second appeal in a suit for a decree directing the defendants to renew the lease of certain land specified at the foot of the plaint for a further period of 30 years with effect from 10th May, 1972. Although the defendants were three in number, the real defendant is only one, namely, the State of Uttar Pradesh, the other two defendants being surplusage, and indeed the name of the third defendant-respondent Sri N. C. Saxena, Secretary to the Government of Uttar Pradesh was deleted from the array of the parties in this Court.

(2.) The earstwhile princely State of Rampur entered into an agreement dated 28th October, 1974 with M/s. Juggi Lal Kamlapat Singhania agreeing to grant certain land on certain terms. The plaintiff company came to acquire the rights of M/s. Juggi Lal Kamlapat under that agreement with certain modifications in a series of transactions which it is not material to detail in this judgment, inasmuch, as the then Government of Rampur made the grant of 39.08 acres of land to the plaintiff by an instrument dated 29th June, 1949, a copy of which is Ext. 2 on the record. The instrument, after setting forth the earlier transactions shows that the plaintiff company, referred to as the lessee in the agreement "is now in possession of 39.08 acres and whereas the lessee has requested the lessor (Government of Rampur) to execute the deed of lease in favour of the lessee to which the lessor has agreed, it is hereby mutually agreed and declared as under:--

(3.) These are all the terms of the so-called lease and I have quoted them in extenso because the decision of the case turns upon their interpretation. The few more facts relevant for the purposes of the decision of this case are that when the plaintiff applied for the renewal of the lease to the Government of Uttar Pradesh, which had in the meanwhile come to acquire all the rights and the liabilities of the lessor under the said grant, on the merger of princely State of Rampur in the Union of India, the Government of Uttar Pradesh informed the plaintiff, by letter dated 30th March, 1972, that the Governor had been pleased to decide not to renew the lease, without assigning any reason therefor, the suit was then filed after serving a notice under Section 80 of the Civil P. C. The defence was that the land was originally let out by the princely State of Rampur for the purposes of promoting industrial development in the area but that object was never achieved and the Company was not functioning properly in spite of the help rendered by the Government of Rampur and by the Government of the State of U. P. The reasons pleaded by it to justify the refusal to renew the lease would appear to be those contained in paragraphs 13, 14 and 15 of the written statement. They run as follows:--