OM PARKASH Vs. JASWANT RAI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Om Parkash Sondhi has filed this revision petition against the order of the Appellate Authority, dated January 8, 1974 by which application for ejectment filed by the respondent was allowed and the order of ejectment was passed against the petitioner.

(2.) After hearing the learned counsel for the parties, I am of the view that this petition deserves to be allowed.

(3.) The first contention raised by Mr. Mehta, learned counsel for the petitioner, is that the landlord in the instant case has not pleaded nor proved the conditions mention in section 13(2)(a)(i) of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), and as such on this ground alone the petition for ejectment is liable to be rejected. In support of his contention, the learned counsel has relied on two decisions of this court, in Lal Chand v. Parshotam Lal, 1974 76 PunLR 594 and Rajinder Singh Nanda v. Kewal Krishan, 1975 RCR(Rent) 325. Respecting this contention Mr. Ram Rang, learned counsel for the respondent very fairly concedes that the application filed for ejectment does suffer from this infirmity as the condition given in section 13(3)(a)(i)(c) has not been pleaded and on that score the ejectment petition may not be strictly maintainable. However, the learned counsel submits that instead of dismissing the petition, the landlord-applicant be permitted to amend the petition. After giving my thoughtful consideration to the entire matter, I find that no ground for the amendment of the petition has been made out. It was legally incumbent on the Landlord Applicant to have pleaded and proved all the three ingredients as given in clauses (a), (b) and (c) of section 13(3)(a)(i) of the Act. It is only thereafter that he could succeed in obtaining an order of ejectment. The ejectment application, without pleading the three ingredients, was defective and should have been straightway dismissed. Merely this fact that such a point which is purely a legal one was not raised either before the Rent Controller or the Appellate Authority, would be no ground to reject the conditions of Mr. Mehta in this respect. Even if a tenant at the outset does not raise such an objection, then also he can show at any stage that the application for ejectment has not been filed in accordance with law and is liable to be rejected on that score. As earlier observed, it is not disputed that all the three ingredients have not been pleaded, with the result, that the condition of Mr. Mehta, learned counsel, prevails and on that ground alone the application filed by the landlord is liable to be dismissed.