MONOMOHAN MOITRA Vs. GOBINDA DAS CHOWDHURY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by the Defendant who is a monthly tenant in respect of Premises No. 215, Lansdowne Road and it arises out of an action in ejectment on determination of the tenancy by a notice to quit. The case of the Plaintiff is that the tenancy of the Defendant commenced on the 16th Nov., 1943, at a monthly rent of Rs. 150 under an order of the Rent Controller dated 26th Nov., 1943, that the Plaintiff served a notice asking the Defendant to vacate on the expiry of 15th Sept., 1944, but as the Defendant did not vacate the Plaintiff instituted the suit on 23rd April, 1945, on which date the Calcutta House Rent Control Order was in operation. The Plaintiff alleged that as the Defendant was a defaulter he was not entitled to the protection of the Calcutta House Rent Control Order and that the permission of the Rent Controller had been obtained. The defence of the Defendant so far as it is material for the purposes of the present appeal was that he was not a defaulter inasmuch as he had deposited the rent with the Rent Controller.

(2.) At the time the suit was brought to trial the Calcutta House Rent Control Order had been replaced by the Calcutta Rent Ordinance (Bengal Ordinance No. V of 1946) which came into operation on 1st Oct., 1946.

(3.) Sec. 12 of the Calcutta Rent Ordinance provides that no decree for ejectment shall be made so long as the tenant pays rent to the full extent "allowable by this Ordinance" and sub-section (4) (b) provides that no tenant shall be entitled to the benefit of that section unless in the case where any rent has accrued due before the commencement of the Ordinance he has paid within one month of such commencement all arrears of rent due by him to the full extent allowable by that Ordinance.