BIBHUTI BHUSAN Vs. SURENDRA MOHAN LAHIRI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS Rule was issued at the instance of the tenant defendant. The plaintiff filed a suit for ejectment in 1947 and, as is usual, though he claims the house for his personal use and occupation, he is being driven from pillar to post. The Calcutta Rent Ordinance, 1946 was then in force. The landlord got the permission of the Rent Controller. The Rent Controller granted a conditional permission.

(2.) THE tenant filed an appeal to the District Judge, 24 -Parganas under the Ordinance. The District Judge in deciding the appeal very rightly passed a legal order by granting the permission unconditionally. Had the original order of the Rent Controller stood, there might have been some justification for the contention raised before us that the permission was not legal.

(3.) THEN the Ordinance was extended by a further Ordinance after the suit had been filed with the permission. Then the Ordinance expired and the New West Bengal Premises Rent Control (Temporary Provisions) Act, 1948, was passed and came into force on 1st December 1948. The contention put forward before us is that as the Rent Ordinance under which the permission was granted expired, the suit brought by the landlord abated. The suit brought by the landlord is because of the rights given to him under the general law. The Rent Control Ordinance puts certain bars to his right to institute the suit. So far as he was concerned, he had those bars removed by getting the permission, but the removal of the bars themselves by the Legislature not continuing the Ordinance itself has nothing to do with his right to sue, or can in no way abate his claim. The utmost that it can do but we do not decide at all whether it actually does so or not, is to deprive the defendant of certain defences which he might have had if no permission had been taken in such a case. The question does not even arise in the present case.