KAILASH WATI Vs. SURINDER KUMAR GUPTA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS revision petition is directed against the order of the Rent Controller dated August 25,1988, whereby the application filed by the tenant under Section 19 of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act (hereinafter called the Act), was allowed and the sanction was granted to the tenant to file a complaint against his landlady.

(2.) THE tenant Surinder Kumar filed an application for getting necessary permission to file the complaint against the landlady under Section 19 of the Act, alleging that he was the tenant on the shop at a monthly rent of Rs. 250/ -. The landlady filed the application for ejectment from the above said shop on the ground of non -payment of rent for the following periods. April and July, 1983; April, 1984; January, May and October, 1985, and January, 1986 to the date of filing of the application. The tenant, according to him, to avoid his ejectment, tendered a sum, of Rs. 3, (sic)50/- as rent for 13 months and Rs. 85/-as interest and Rs. 60/- as costs as assessed by the Court which were duly accepted by the landlady and consequently, the ejectment application was dismissed as infructuous. No finding as such was given as to whether the tenant was in arrears of rent or not. According to the tenant, since the landlady had demanded and received the rent twice for the same period, she was liable to be prosecuted. In the reply filed on behalf of the landlady, she denied that she ever received the rent twice for the said period as alleged. She also pleaded that the application as such was not maintainable The learned Rent Controller after framing the issues came to the conclusion that since the landlady had received the rent for the month of December, 1985, so it was presumed that she bad received the rent for the period prior to December, 1985. On that presumption, it was held that she had already received the rent for six months, as alleged and therefore, according to the learned Rent Controller, it was a case of double payment. Consequently he granted the necessary permission as contemplated under Section 19 of the Act, for violation of Section 9 of the Act.

(3.) THE learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the finding of the Kent Controller is based on presumptions Since the rent was being paid monthly through cheques by the tenant, the said presumption, if any, was not available to the tenant When the landlady found that the cheque for the said months was not deposited, she claimed the rent by way of arrears which were duly tendered by the tenant without any protest. In any case, argued the learned counsel, the provisions of Section 19 were not at all attracted, nor there was any violation of Section 9 of the Act, as alleged by the tenant. Since there was no violation of sub section (2) of Section 9, the provisions of Section 19 were not attracted.