BHAGWANTI Vs. HANS RAJ

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is landlady's petition whose ejectment application was allowed by the Rent Controller but the eviction order was set aside in appeal.

(2.) THE landlady sought the ejectment of her tenant Hans Raj from the house in the dispute inter alia on the ground that her son Om Parkash, who was in employment in Delhi has retired from service in September, 1982 and after the retirement, he wants to shift to his native town Malerkotla along with his family to reside with the applicant-landlady. At present the landlady was living in the ancestral house of her husband, who has four sons and are in occupation thereof. There are only two rooms in occupation of the landlady and her husband in the said house. The plan of the said house occupied by the landlady is Exhibit A. 5. The application was contested inter alia on the ground that the house in dispute was not bonafide required by the landlady and the application had been filed to pressurise him to enhance the rent. It was also pleaded that the landlady and her sons were living in separate houses and thus she did not require the house in question for her own use and occupation. The learned Rent Controller found that the landlady bonafide required the premises in question for her own use and occupation. Consequently, eviction order was passed. In appeal the learned Appellate Authority reversed the said finding of the Rent Controller and dismissed the ejectment application. Dissatisfied with the same, the landlady has filed this petition in this Court.

(3.) AFTER hearing the learned counsel for the parties and going through the relevant evidence on the record, I am of the considered view that the learned Appellate Authority acted illegally and arbitrarily in the exercise of his jurisdiction. The whole approach of the Appellate Authority seems to be misconceived. It has been observed by the Appellate Authority the "moreover, from the statement of Lachhman Dass (A.W. 8), it is abundantly clear that he is occupying four rooms in the ancestral house and at present his four sons living with him are unmarried and, as such, they can be easily accommodated in the portion of the house which is in possession of Lachhman Dass (A.W. 8). Out of the ancestral house, two rooms are admittedly in the occupation of Wali Ram and his wife and out of these two rooms, if at all the mother of Om Parkash wants to accommodate his son Om Parkash and his wife, it is not difficult for the old parents, as they are at present to give one of the rooms to Om Parkash (A.W. 1) and his wife." Thus from the said observations, it is quite evident that the whole approach was wrong. It is not for the Authorities under the Act to suggest how the landlords should be seen from the landlord's point of view. The ejectment could be denied only if the requirement was bonafide and was actuated by some ulterior motive. It has been found as a fact that only two rooms are in occupation of the landlady and her husband in the ancestral house, which accommodation is highly insufficient for their requirement as well as for their son Om Parkash (A.W. 1) who has retired from service and wants to come back to his native place at Malerkotla. He does not own only other house either in Malerkotla or in Delhi where his sons are residing. Thus the requirement of Om Parkash to go to his native place at Malerkotla could not be held to be not bonafide in any manner. It was not necessary for Om Parkash to state that he was not pulling well with his sons and therefore he wanted to shift to Malerkotla. In Delhi no house is owned by Om Parkash and therefore his desire to got to live with his parents at his native place was most genuine. Admittedly, the landlady has four sons Lachhman Dass, Om Parkash, Gian Chand and Shanker Dass. Out of these three have appeared in the witness box. Her husband Bali Ram has also appeared as A.W. 9 as her Mukhtiar-i-am. Lachhman Dass for four sons. The eldest son is of 32 years old. Thus the accommodation in the ancestral house, the plan of which is Exhibit A.5 was not sufficient to accommodate Om Parkash and his parents. The argument raised on behalf of the tenant that Om Parkash had been living in Delhi since 1968 because his son has settled there, was no relevance. He retired on 30th September, 1982 and the ejectment application was filed on 24th May, 1982 in anticipation of his retirement. The judgment relied upon by the tenant-respondent Kewal Krishan v. Smt. Janki Devi, 1981 (2) R.C.R. 336, in which it was held that if the landlady was living in the house of her husband, her occupation will be deemed as a matter of right unless there are circumstances to show otherwise and thus the landlady was not entitled to eject the tenant from the house owned by her, has no applicability to the facts of the present case. Here the plea taken by the landlady was that the accommodation in her ancestral house was insufficient.