Delhi District Court
Shri Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs Shri Chanakya Gulati on 18 September, 2019
IN THE COURT OF SHRI GIRISH KATHPALIA,
DISTRICT & SESSIONS JUDGE (HQs)
TIS HAZARI COURTS, DELHI.
RCT No. 51/2018
1. SHRI MUNEESH KUMAR KOHLI
S/o SHRI KRISHAN LAL KOHLI
2. SHRI GIRISH KUMAR @ GIRISH
S/o SHRI KRISHAN LAL KOHLI
BOTH AVAILABLE DURING DAY TIME AT
5904, SHOP No.2 GALI No. 3
DEV NAGAR, KAROL BAGH
NEW DELHI 110005
PERMANENT RESIDENTS OF
25/37 SHAKTI NAGAR,
DELHI 110007
.....APPELLANTS
VERSUS
SHRI CHANAKYA GULATI
S/o LATE SHRI JASWANT SINGH GULATI
R/o FLAT No. 33, APNA GHAR SOCIETY
PITAMPURA, NEAR RANI BAGH
DELHI 110034
... ..RESPONDENTS
Date of filing : 08.05.2018
First date before this court : 09.07.2019
Arguments on appeal on : 12.09.2019
Date of Decision : 18.09.2019
RCT No. 51/2018 Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs. Chanakya Gulati Page 1 of 6 pages
Appearance : Shri Deepak Gupta, counsel for appellant
Shri Vibhor Goela, counsel for respondent
JUDGMENT
1. In this appeal brought under Section 38 of the Delhi Rent Control Act, the appellant tenant has assailed order dated 28.03.2018 of learned Additional Rent Controller, passed during the eviction proceedings under Section 14(1)(e) of the Delhi Rent Control Act. Upon service of notice, respondent landlord entered appearance through counsel. I heard learned counsel for both sides.
2. Briefly stated, circumstances leading to the present appeal are as follows. The present respondent landlord filed eviction petition against the appellant tenant on the ground stipulated under Section 14(1)
(e) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, in which the appellant tenant upon service of notice filed an application seeking leave to defend. The respondent landlord filed reply to the application for leave to defend. Thereafter on 28.03.2018, the appellant tenant filed rejoinder to the reply to the application for leave to defend. Along with the rejoinder, the appellant tenant sought to file certain additional documents. By way of impugned order dated 28.03.2018, learned trial court accepted the rejoinder on record but refused to accept the additional documents of the appellant tenant. The learned trial court based her decision to reject the additional documents on the basis of judgment of Hon'ble Supreme RCT No. 51/2018 Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs. Chanakya Gulati Page 2 of 6 pages Court of India in the case of Prithipal Singh vs Satpal Singh (Dead) through his LRs, (2010) 2SCC 15. Hence, the present appeal by the tenant.
3. During arguments, learned counsel for appellant reiterated the above narrative and contended that the impugned order is liable to be set aside in view of judgment of the Hon'ble Delhi High Court in the case of Arvind Kumar Jain vs Jagdish Lal Khanijo, CM(M) 1191/18 decided by Hon'ble Mr. Justice Vinod Goel on 26.11.2018. On the other hand, learned counsel for respondent tenant supported the impugned order contending that the statutory time period of fifteen days for filing leave to defend application is inflexible, so no additional document could be taken on record after expiry of that period.
4. In the case of Arvind Kumar Jain (supra), the Hon'ble Delhi High Court dealt with a situation similar to the present case. In the said case also, the trial court had rejected the request of the tenant to take on record documents alongwith the rejoinder to the reply to application for leave to defend in the proceedings under Section 14(1)(e) of the Delhi Rent Control Act. In the said case also the trial court had quoted the judgment of Hon'ble Supreme Court of India in the case of Prithipal Singh (supra). After elaborate discussion of legal position, the Hon'ble Single Judge of the Delhi High Court held thus:
RCT No. 51/2018 Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs. Chanakya Gulati Page 3 of 6 pages "9. A learned Single Judge of this Court in Mirajuddin vs. Mohammad Habib & Ors. 2014 SCC Online Del 3803 while referring to Prithipal Singh (supra) has held "once the period of 15 days is sacrosanct, it is not permissible to a tenant after the period of 15 days to keep on filing affidavits or documents to urge grounds for seeking leave to defend, and which if permitted to be done, will be violative of the ratio of the judgment of the Supreme Court in the case of Prithipal Singh (supra) that 15 days period for filing of leave to defend application is nonflexible and a fixed period, and every aspect for seeking leave to defend has to be stated within 15 days only and not thereafter. Therefore, the so called subsequent events which are sought to be urged cannot be urged on behalf of the petitioner". Similar view was taken by the learned Single Judge of this Court in Mohd. Burhan vs. Triloki Nath Nirmal 2014 SCC Online Del 4320 and Sanjeev Gupta & Ors. vs. Sh. Subhash Kumar Gupta & Anr. 2014 SCC Online Del 4369. It is noticed that question of filing documents before RC subsequent to stage of filing of leave to defend was never the issue in all these three cases.
10. Facts of the present case are however, distinguishable. The petitioner/defendant had pleaded in his application for leave to defend that the daughterinlaw of the respondent is not dependent upon the respondent as the son of the respondent Sh.
Kapil Khanijo has been running number of companies including M/s J.J. Feb Tex Pvt. Ltd. wherein he has a 50% share holding. The respondent has denied this fact, which the petitioner never expected from him to deny. This led the petitioner to place on record two documents in question pertaining to the said M/s J.J. Fab Pvt. Ltd. wherein partners with a share holding of 50% each. These documents have been obtained by RCT No. 51/2018 Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs. Chanakya Gulati Page 4 of 6 pages the petitioner from the official website of the Registrar of Companies ("ROC"). The learned RC has already permitted the petitioner to place on record the rejoinder to the reply of his application for leave to defend by impugned order. Prithipal Singh's case (supra) also does not bar filing of the documents after filing leave to defend. The respondent/plaintiff cannot be prejudiced if in these peculiar circumstances of the case, these two documents are allowed to be taken on record".
(emphasis supplied)
5. In the present case also, the learned Additional Rent Controller had already permitted filing of rejoinder to reply to the application for leave to defend. Alongwith the rejoinder, only two documents were sought to be placed on record by the appellant tenant and foundation of both those documents was already laid in the application for leave to defend.
5.1 One of those two documents sought to be filed by the appellant is a photograph of premises alongwith the newspaper reflecting the date, which was filed in order to meet the denial by the respondent landlord in para 24 of the reply to the leave to defend application. 5.2 The second document sought to be filed by the appellant alongwith the rejoinder was a copy of reply dated 24.10.2017 sent by the appellant to counsel for the present respondent landlord in reply to notice dated 17.09.2017. In para 8 of his leave to defend application, the appellant tenant specifically pleaded about notice dated 17.09.2017 and reply dated 24.10.2017 but in the corresponding paragraph of reply to the RCT No. 51/2018 Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs. Chanakya Gulati Page 5 of 6 pages application for leave to defend, the respondent landlord admitted only having issued notice dated 17.09.2017 and pointed out that reply dated 24.10.2017 had not even been filed, which necessitated filing of a copy of that reply with postal record alongwith the rejoinder as the appellant tenant could not have anticipated that the respondent landlord would deny having received the reply.
5.3 By way of the said additional documents, no new ground was sought to be set up.
6. The present case is thus squarely covered by the judgment of Hon'ble Delhi High Court in the case of Arvind Kumar Jain (supra).
7. In view of above discussion, the impugned order dated 28.03.2018 is set aside and the appeal is allowed. Consequently, the additional documents filed by the appellant tenant with rejoinder to the reply to the application for leave to defend before the trial court are taken on record.
8. Copy of this judgment be sent to the learned trial court alongwith trial court record and appeal file be consigned to records.
Announced in the open court on
this day of 18th September, 2019 (GIRISH KATHPALIA)
District & Sessions Judge (HQs)
GIRISH
Digitally signed
by GIRISH Tis Hazari Courts
KATHPALIA
KATHPALIA Date: 2019.09.19 Delhi 18.09.2019 (a)
13:01:39 +0530
RCT No. 51/2018 Muneesh Kumar Kohli vs. Chanakya Gulati Page 6 of 6 pages