GHANSHYAMDAS GUPTA Vs. SHIVALDAS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ON 9.10.1985 the instant petitioner Ghanshyamdas Gupta, impleading his brothers, Ramjidas Gupta and Haridas Gupta (herein proforma non-petitioner Nos. 3 and 4) also, albeit as proforma applicants, moved the Rent Controlling Authority, Gwalior, for short, the Authority, under Section 23-A of the M.P. Accommodation Control Act, 1961, for short, the Act for an order against non-petitioner Nos. 1 and 2 for their eviction from the suit premises. The application having been rejected the instant revision is preferred under Section 23-E of the Act. All the non-petitioners having been duly noticed, on their failure to enter appearance to oppose the revision SPC to each of them was also duly issued Still, there is no appearance even today on their behalf and as such I have no option except to decide the matter looking into the records and the case law cited by Shri R.D. Jain, counsel for the petitioner.

(2.) IN his application the applicant stated that he was a retired Government servant who has rendered service in Maulana Azad Medical College Delhi, under the Central Government as a Professor in the said institution, upto 18.7.1983. Because he wanted to set up private practice at Gwalior after his retirement, he required bonafide, for his personal use and occupation, the suit premises which was in occupation of the non-petitioner Nos. 1 and 2. In para 4 he made a categorical statement that his brothers Ramjidas and Haridas were proforma applicants (albeit being co-owners) and further that it was the requirement of the petitioner himself of the suit house which necessitated the Authority being moved for an order against the tenants non-petitioners to put the petitioner/landlord in possession of the suit premises. It may be noticed that the petitioner's plea of his entitlement under Section 23-J was self evident and indeed its scope only was misconceived by the Authority by a wrong interpretation of the cognate provision of Section 23-D(3).

(3.) I have little doubt that the two tests envisaged in Smt. Iqbal Begum (supra) and Lalta Prasad (supra, never entered the Authority's consideration in passing the impugned order. Indeed, the Authority could not evidently anticipate the decisions of this Court which have been rendered recently, after the impugned order was passed. There mere fact that the applicant (herein the petitioner) was a co-owner of the suit house was considered his disqualification to deny him the benefit of Section 23-J which, in my opinion, was not the requirement which the Authority was empowered under Section 23-A(a) to consider. The plurality of ownership of any 'accommodation' (as in the instant case) cannot, in my opinion, saddle the applicant-landlord with any disqualification so as to kill the statutory right accorded to him under Section 23-J. If he has pleaded 'his' own personal requirement of the premises as is done in the instant case, his right to maintain and pursue the application to prove his case under Section 23-A(a) cannot be nipped in the bud.