BABOO LAL Vs. DAKHINI DIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) JUDGEMENT This is plaintiff s application in revision under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure for setting aside the judgment and decree of the District Judge and to restore the judgment and decree of the trial court.

(2.) THE plaintiff-applicant filed a suit for recovery of arrears of rent and ejectment against the defendant-opposite party. The defendant contested the suit on the ground that the plaintiff had no title to the house in question and he was not entitled to rent and that no relationship of landlord and tenant existed between the parties. The trial court decreed the plaintiff s suit. On revision-application under Section 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act by the defendant, the District Judge set aside the trial court s decree and dismissed the plaintiff s suit. Aggrieved, the plaintiff has preferred this revision.

(3.) SECTION 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act lays down that the court may satisfy itself that a decree made in any case decided by a Court of Small Causes was according to law. The court while exercising powers under Section 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act must confine itself to ascertain as to whether the decree of the Judge, Small Cause Court was according to law. While exercising the jurisdiction it is not open to the court to re-assess the evidence or to substitute its own conclusion of fact in place of that reached by the Judge Smell Cause Court although it is open to the court to satisfy itself that there was no miscarriage of justice due to mistake of law. In Hari Shankar v. Girdhari Lal (AIR 1963 SC 698), the scope of Sec. 35 of the Delhi and Ajmer Rent (Control) Act, 1952 which conferred revisional power on the High Court to satisfy itself that the decision of the court below was according to law, was considered. The Supreme Court held that under Section 35, High Court could not interfere with the plain finding of fact arrived at by the courts below as the phrase according to law did not contemplate re-assessment of the value of the evidence or substitution of the findings of fact in place of those reached by the court below.