GURDIT SINGH Vs. SHANKAR LAL MISRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This revision petition arises out of an application under section 13 of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949 (Act III of 1949), hereinafter referred to as the Act, filed by Gurdit Singh landlord petitioner, hereinafter called the landlord, against Shankar Lal and Kanshi Ram Aggarwal tenant-respondents hereinafter called the tenants, whereby the landlord sought to evict the tenants from the promises in dispute, interalia, on the ground that he needed the premises for his own occupation.

(2.) The application of the landlord was resisted by the tenants, with the plea that he did not need the house for his own occupation, and that the application was intended to help Dr. Jagjit Singh to get vacant possession of the premises, for the landlord had already entered into a contract with Dr. Jagjit Singh to sell the same to him. It was also pleaded that the landlord did not need the precises in dispute for his own occupation, as he had settled down permanently at Deliradun.

(3.) The, learned Rent Controller, as also the appellate authority, concurrently held that the application for the eviction of the tenants was not bona fide inasmuch as the landlord, in fact, intended to give the premises under the tenancy of the tenants to another tenant at a higher rent and it was for at purpose that the eviction of the tenants in the present case had been sought. For coming to that finding, both the Courts below based themselves (1) on the oral evidence of Shankar Lal tenant, as also on the copies of the two judgments, Exhibits R. 2 and R. 3, which were to the effect that the landlord got two rooms, out of the four of which the ground floor consists, vacated from one Bhola Singh on the ground of personal necessity; and that the said accommodation after being occupied for about a year and a half by the landlord was given to the tenants, along with two other rooms which till then had been in occupation of the landlord himself in addition to the two rooms that be had got vacated from Bhola Singh, at a monthly rent of Rs. 200/- and (2) on the omission of the landlord to expressly mention in the application the ingredients of sub-paragraphs (b) and (c) of paragraph (i) of sub-section (3) of section 13 of the Act.