METONIC INDIA PRIVATE LTD Vs. KRISHNA BEHL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) DOUBTING the correctness of the decision of the teamed single Judge in Panna Lal v. Finn Vakil Chand Pawan Kumar ( 1980) 82 Pun LR 734, Mr. Justice S. S. Sodhi (as his Lordship then was) referred this revision to a Division Bench.

(2.) AS stated by his Lordship, the controversy in this case raises the question : Where a tenant in order to obtain a loan or cash credit facility from the Bank, pledges his goods, which the Bank stores in a part of the demised premises over which it thereafter has exclusive possession, in the sense, that it is locked and sealed by the Bank and the tenant cannot without the permission of the Bank, enter that portion or deal with the goods stored there, does it amount to subletting.

(3.) THE undisputed facts are that the tenant has taken the premises on lease for carrying on business and he obtained loan from respondent No. 2-Bank by pledging the goods and failed to discharge the loan forcing the Bank to take possession of the pledged goods in exercise of its powers under the agreement of pledge of goods and kept the goods in a room of the demised premises and kept the said room in its possession under lock and key. According to the landlord, this amounts to subletting and the tenant has made himself liable to be evicted on the ground of subletting.