MADAN LAL GOYAL Vs. RAVINDER BHUSHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS revision petition has been filed on behalf of the tenant against whom order of ejectment has been passed by both the authorities below.

(2.) THE landlord sought the ejectment of his tenant, inter-alia, on the ground of non-payment of arrears of rent for the period from 1.5.1968 to 31.5.1975 at the rate of Rs. 50/- per month. The application was contested on the plea that the rate of rent was Rs. 15/- per month and not Rs. 50/- per month and this matter has already been decided between the parties earlier. It was further pleaded that no rent was due from the tenant as alleged. The learned Rent Controller came to the conclusion that the rate of rent is Rs. 15/- per month, but the tender was short inasmuch as the arrears of the rent from 1.5.1968 to 31.5.1975 and 1.9.1976 to 1.2.1979 have not been paid. The other ground of personal necessity was found against the landlord. As a result of these findings an order of ejectment was passed in favour of the landlord and against the tenant. In appeal, the learned Appellate Authority affirmed the said findings of the trial Court and thus maintained the order of eviction passed against the tenant. Dissatisfied with the same, the tenant has come up in revision in this Court.

(3.) AFTER hearing the learned counsel for the parties, I am of the considered opinion that there is no force in this petition. It is admitted by the tenant himself while in the witness-box that he never paid any rent to the landlord except in the Court as and when ejectment application was filed against him. It is the common case of the parties that the first ejectment application was filed against the tenant in the year 1975 in which the arrears of rent were claimed from 1.5.1968 to 31.5.1975. The said arrears of rent were not paid by the tenant even at the rate of Rs. 15/- per month which he himself admitted. However, that application was dismissed on the ground that no valid notice for terminating the tenancy was given though it was found as a fact that the tenant was in arrears for that particular period. The second application for ejectment was filed on 28.11.1978 i.e. during the pendency of the earlier application in which the rent was claimed for the subsequent period i.e. after 1975 which was duly tendered and therefore, the application was dismissed as withdrawn. The landlord had to file the third application i.e. the present one for ejectment on the ground of non-payment of arrears of rent. In this application, the arrears for the period from 1.6.1968 to 31.5.1975 which were found due in the first ejectment application were also claimed. In the written statement, it was never pleaded that the rent for the period was not due and it was paid to the landlord. Moreover, as stated earlier, the tenant admitted in his statement that no amount of rent to the landlord was paid outside the Court. Thus, there is no illegality or impropriety in the concurrent findings of the two authorities below that the tenant is liable for ejectment on account of the non-payment of arrears of rent. The plea that the landlord did not come with clean hands as he claimed rent at the rate of Rs. 50/- per month, is not available to the tenant, because he did not pay even the rent at the rate of Rs. 15/- per month which he himself admitted to be the rent.