BENU ROY Vs. MANINDRA NATH CHATTERJEE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The question raised upon this rule under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure at the instance of the tenant-defendant is: whether or no his application dated April 8, 1968, under Section 17B, Sub-section (1) of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy (Amendment) Act, 4 of 1968, (shortened hereafter into the Act) is time-barred by virtue of the provisions in Section 17B, Sub-section (1), itself. The learned munsiff holds, it is.

(2.) As a matter of words, there appears to be no escape from the conclusion the learned munsif has come to. And what are the words? Other ingredients being there--they are very much there--the tenant may, within a period of sixty days of the commencement of the Act, make the requisite application. So, what is the date of such commencement? Section 1, Sub-section (2) of the Act answers it: "It shall be deemed to have come Into force on the 26th day of August 1967." Sixty days from that day expired on October 25, 1967. But the petitioner filed his application on April 8, 1968, It is thus much beyond sixty days from August 26, 1967. Will it, therefore, be barred? As a matter of words only, it looks like that.

(3.) Mr. Chatterjee, appearing in support of the rule, does not deny that the way I have proceeded does lead to the conclusion I have come to. But he contends, in that case there cannot be a single application under Section 17B, Sub-section (1), of the Act which was published for the first time in the Calcutta Gazette Extraordinary dated March 26. 1968, when a period of sixty days from August 26, 1967, had long passed by. I, for my part, shall not deny that what Mr. Chatterjee says is very true. What then is the way out?