BABULAL RAMKISANDAS PODDAR Vs. GANESH PRASAD BAJORIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a plaintiffs appeal from a judgment and decree dated 13th September, 1965 of the City Civil Court, Bombay, in Short Cause Suit No. 2433 of 1959, dismissing his suit on the footing of a licence.

(2.) It is not in dispute that the plaintiff is a tenant in respect of a premises on the third floor in building No. 187, Dadyseth Agiary Lane, Bombay-2 consisting of three rooms . The suit premises consists of one room which is at the end of the premises of which the plaintiff is a tenant. According to the plaintiff the defendant as his friend and in order to accommodate him for a period of six months, he gave the suit room to the defendent as a licensee without charging any rent. The defendant executed an agreement dated 23rd December, 1958 for that purpose. The period expired on 23rd June, 1959. But the defendant did not vacate the room. When the plaintiff called upon the defendant to remove himself from the room, the defendant sent him a false telegram on 22nd July, 1959 claiming sub-tenant of the room. The plaintiff thereupon on 23rd July, 1959 revoked the licence, although it was not necessary because the licence had expired by affluex of time, and filed the present suit on 7th August, 1959 for possession of the suit room.

(3.) The case of the defendant was that he was in possession of the suit room as a sub-tenant of the plaintiff. He admitted having executed the agreement on 23rd December, 1958, but contended that it was meant only for the protection of the plaintiff against his own landlord who might seek eviction of the plaintiff from the premises leased out to him on the ground that he had sub-leased a portion of it. The writing was not to be acted upon. In fact, the defendant had come into possession of the suit room on 16th May, 1956 as a sub-tenant of the plaintiff and he was paying rent of Rs. 65/- per month to the plaintiff. The plaintiff, however, did not pass any receipts for the payment of rent. On one occasion, that is, on 19th October, 1957, the defendant paid a sum of Rs. 426/- to the plaintiff by cheque because the plaintiff was in arrears of rent for three months and his landlord was pressing for the payment of the rent. This amount was adjusted against the rent which the defendant was liable to pay to the plaintiff at the rate of Rs. 65/- per month. The defendant was thus a sub-tenant of the plaintiff and not a licensee and the plaintiff could not evict him except under the provisions of the Bombay Rent Act.