MOHAMMAD ISMAIL Vs. SAKINA BEGUM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this revision the only point that has been pressed is that the Small Causes Court ought to have stayed the suit and not passed a decree when it was brought to its notice that an application for fixation of fair rent was pending before the Rent Controller. The lower court rejected the contention of the applicant on the ground that, since it was admitted by the Petitioner that rent was due for sixteen months from July, 1950 to October, 1951, there was no necessity to await the decision of the Rent Controller. The Petitioner had taken the leased premises from the Respondent on a rent of Rs. 45/ - per month with respect to which he had, after the suit was filed in the Small Causes Court, applied to the Rent Controller for fixation of fair rent. The learned Advocate for the revision -Petitioner argues on the authority of Dulhanmal Rizumal v. Abdul Kadar, AIR 1950 MP 8 that the Small Causes Court ought to have stayed the suit. In the aforesaid case it was decided that in a suit for recovery of rent in which the quantum of rent recoverable by the landlord is in contest and

(2.) THIS judgment was followed by my learned brother Dr. Siadat Ali Khan in an unreported judgment in the case of Mohd. Fakruddin v. Syed Roshan Ali Revn. Petn. No. 125/4 of 1951 dated the 5th October, 1951 in which he directed the Small Causes Court to write and enforce the judgment after a reasonable rent is fixed by the Rent Controller. As against this judgment there is a judgment of the Patna High Court in P. C. Gangulee v. Smt. Kadhuri Devi, 6 Dom LR (Pat) 167, where it was held that there is no warrant for the proposition that because a proceeding for the fixation of fair rent is pending before the Controller, the suit pending before the Munsif for arrears of rent should be stayed.

(3.) THE principle upon which a subsequent suit is' stayed under Section 10 of the Code of Civil Procedure (corresponding to Section 12 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1877) is, as observed by Mahmood J. in the case of -