RANJIT PATIRAJ CHANBE Vs. BEHRAM SHERIAR IRANI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal from an order returning the plaint for presentation to the proper Court. The facts are as follows: The respondents -defendants are the owners of the suit property. They filed a suit against the appellant -plaintiff in the Court of Small Causes under the provisions of the Bombay Rents, Hotel and Lodging House Rates Control Act, 1947, for eviction on the ground that ho was their tenant and that rent was in arrears for more than six months. The plaintiff contested the suit contending that he was not a tenant of the defendants but was the tenant of one Atmaram Sadashiv, who himself was a tenant of the defendants, The Court tried the issues which arose on these conflicting claims and came to the conclusion that the plaintiff was a tenant of the defendants and as he was found to be in arrears of rent for more than six months, the Court made a decree. The plaintiff carried the usual appeals available to him tinder the provisions of the Rent Act but failed. He then instituted the present suit alleging that lie was a sub -tenant of Atmaram Sadashiv, that he had no privity of contract with the defendants and that he should be declared to be entitled to remain in possession of the property. He claimed necessary injunction restraining the defendants, their agents and servants from executing the warrant of possession in the rent suit. The trial Court holding that the Court had no jurisdiction returned the plaint for presentation to the proper Court.

(2.) WE will refer to the Bombay Rents, Hotel and Lodging House Rates Control Act, 1947, as the Rent Act and the Presidency Small Cause Courts Act, 1882, as the Pre. Sim. C. C. Act.

(3.) WE will assume that a right as a tenant is a title, though a Divisional Bench consisting of Chagla C. J. and Dixit J. have held in K. M. Motwani v. Albert Sequeira : (1958)60BOMLR1282 that:.the protection which the Rent Act gives to a tenant or a sub -tenant is a personal right, not a right in property, and what the Explanation to Section 43 (of the Presidency Small Causes Courts Act) contemplates is title and not a personal right.