MANGWINDER CHAHAL Vs. RAMESH KUMAR SUDERA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The revision petition is against the refusal of grant of leave to defend, brought at the instance of the tenant in an application filed by the landlord under Section 13-B of the East Punjab Rent Restriction Act, 1949 as applicable to Chandigarh. The landlord's plea was that he has been a person of Indian origin and a citizen of U. K. but he wanted to return to India and permanently reside at Chandigarh where the demised property is situated. The tenant took up several defences in the application for grant of leave, they are; i) the landlord has contended that the tenant is in default of rent which is a ground available under Section 13 and not under Section 13-B; ii) he is a permanent resident of U.K.and unless he secures an Indian visa he cannot return to India and occupy the premises iii) the bona fides of the landlord are themselves suspect. In as much as the building of which the demised property is a part comprised of ground plus two floors, of which the ground floor was in occupation of yet another tenant, the first floor had been retained by the landlord himself and the second floor had alone been rented out to him. As far as the ground floor was concerned the landlord had actually evicted a tenant who was already there and he has let out to a fresh tenant. He has no requirement to vacate the tenant only at the second floor and if he was really interested in coming back, he would not have rented out the ground floor.

(2.) As regards the contention that the petition suffers from a fundamental technical defect in joining also a ground of default of rent admissible under Section 13, I would take the petition itself as founded under Section 13-B and look for answers of whether there is any tenable defence that could allow for a consideration for leave to defend and additional ground which may be irrelevant under Section 13-B need not deter the consideration of whether the defence disclosed contains anything prima facie for the grant of leave. I therefore proceed to consider whether there is any defect in the petition in the manner urged by the learned counsel.

(3.) As regards the contention that the landlord who is a permanent resident of U. K. cannot think of going back to India to settle permanently, the requirement in law is that he shall be "Non Resident Indian" as defined under Section 2 (dd) of the East Punjab Rent Restriction Act, which is reproduced as under. The Section reads as follows:-