NIRMAL CHANDRA MISHRA Vs. STATE OF U P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY means of this writ petition, the Nagar Palika, Aligarh a local body, has impugned and sought quashing of an order dated 1.3.1980, passed by the Prescribed Authority (C.J.M., Aligarh) under U. P. Municipalities Act (hereinafter referred as the Act), whereby allowing a review application of the respondent No. 2, he set aside an order of assessment in respect of a house under Section 147, made by the petitioner and an earlier order of the Prescribed Authority dismissing the appeal against it.

(2.) THE respondent No. 2 admittedly is the owner of House No. 7/13 Mohalla Sarai Baijnath, within the municipal limits of Aligarh.

(3.) ASSESSMENT in this case by the local authority was being made of a rented building. The contention of the respondent No. 2 that the building though occupied by the Bank as tenant, it was not rented for the purposes of assessment, is untenable. The Bank itself vide letter (Annexure '2') informed the local authority that it was paying Rs. 2,580 per month as rent to the respondent No. 2, which of course was being adjusted towards instalments of loan taken by the respondent No. 2. Simply because the amount was not being paid directly to the respondent No. 2, rather was treated as payment of instalments of debt by him, it does not cease to be rent. The building in question was also not one of the category enumerated in Section 140 (1) (a) of the Act which applies to Railway Station, Hotels, Colleges, Schools, Hospitals, Factories, and such buildings. A Bank does not come under any of these categories. Moreover, sub-section (b) of Section 140 (1) of the Act is the provision relevant to the building in question which was fetching rent, and not sub-section (a) which applies to buildings other than those let on rent. There thus was no scope or occasion to entertain the prayer for review of the earlier judgment which was validly passed, much less to allow the same. The impugned order of the Prescribed Authority is thus is unsustainable and deserves to be quashed.