KULENDRA CHANDRA ROY Vs. DEBDAS ROY CHOUDHURY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this application under Article 227 of the Constitution, which has been registered as a Civil Revision Petition, the Petitioner Sri Kulendra Chandra Roy has called in question correctness and validity of the judgment dated 14.9.2006 passed by the Additional District Judge, West Tripura, Agartala (Court No. 2) in RCC (revision) No. 10 of 2005. By the said Judgment the court of revision reversed the findings of the appellate court West Tripura, Agartala in judgment dated 21.7.2005 in RCC (Appeal) No. 02 of 2005 and upheld the decision of the Rent Control Court, Agartala, West Tripura in RCC Case No. 5 of 2003.

(2.) The admitted position, on the anvils of which the present issues are to be adverted to, commenced from 1.6.1979 when there was an agreement between the parties under which the petitioner herein became a tenant under the respondent in respect of the suit premises, situated in a commercial place in Agartala on a monthly rent of Rs. 260/-. But the relation between them ran into foul weather when the landlord instituted a case in 1981 seeking eviction of the tenant. Though the earlier proceeding for eviction proved to be a fiasco and a long spell went by with the tenant in continued possession of the suit premises, the landlord instituted, after about 22 years from the date of the first proceeding in 1981, the present rent control case No. 5 of 2003 seeking eviction of the tenant. Two grounds were advanced in support of the prayer, firstly, the tenant was a defaulter in payment of rent and secondly, the landlord himself was in bonafide need to the said premises for expansion of his small medicine business and for starting a new business for his unemployed son. Though the rent control court after a full-dressed trial did not find merit in the first part, a careful appreciation of the evidence brought on record convinced it to record a finding that the landlord was in bonafide need of the suit premises. It was also observed that the tenant had procured alternative accommodation and started business there under the management of his son. Further observation of that court was that suitable accommodation was available in the area for the tenant for shifting of his present business if he intent so.

(3.) But the learned appellate court noticed that the landlord himself before the trial court that he had constructed a new building and inducted tenants. Noticing this statement the appellate court wondered why some of the rooms were not kept vacant in the new building for his son to start a business or for him to expand his medicine business and why instead he had inducted new tenants. Thus, according to the learned appellate court the landlord had no bonafide need. The findings of the learned trial court on bonafide need of the landlord thus came to be reversed.