Punjab-Haryana High Court
D.D. Malik vs S.M. Nehra on 14 February, 1991
Equivalent citations: (1991)99PLR441
JUDGMENT I.S. Tiwana, J.
1. The order of Rent Controller, Chandigarh, dated 18th September, 1990, impuged herein not only appears to be unusual but illegal also. However, it purports to have been passed in the light of the Supreme Court order dated 11th January, 1990, in Civil Appeal No. 120 of 1990 arising out of S.L.P. (C) No. 236 of 1990. The following undisputed facts furnish the necessary backdrop of the case.
2. The petitioner, as a specified landlord, filed an application under Section 13-A of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949, as applicable to Chandigarh, and hereinafter referred to as the 'Act', to seek eviction of the respondent on the ground that the accommodation in his possession in the local area was not suitable. He duly supported it with his affidavit. The controvert this stand of his, the respondent-tenant filed an affidavit in terms of sub-section (4) of Section 18-A of he Act, requesting leave of the Court to contest the said application. The same was, however, refused by the Court vide its order dated 26th August, 1988. Respondent's revision petition against this order was again dismissed by this Court on 20th December, 1989 He preferred a Special Leave Petition, referred to above, which was allowed by their Lordships of the Supreme Court in the following terms :-
"Special Leave granted. Having heard counsel for both the sides and also perused the material, we are of the opinion that this is a case where the Court below ought not to have refused leave to contest. The landlord is occupying the ground floor besides the entire second floor. The tenant is occupying the first floor. 1 h© question is whether the landlord requires the first floor also This question, in our opinion, could be properly determined only by granting leave to the tenant to contest. There is no need to take a summary procedure since it is a case of additional accommodation.
In the result, we allow the appeal and set aside the impugned orders and grant the tenant leave to contest the proceedings The; Controller shall now proceed according to law. Parties shall appear the Controller on 12 2-1990 to receive further direction. It is needless to state that all the other points are left open."
Now in the light of this order the Rent Controller has expressed the opinion that since the leave to contest has been allowed to the respondent in terms of Section 18-A of the Act, the proceedings in this petition under Section 13-A "are to be conducted as it is an ordinary petition under Section 13 of the Rent Act and the Court is not to follow the procedure as laid down under Section 18-A of the Rent Act." It is this order of the Rent Controller which is impugned in this petition. The order on the fact it. is against the mandate of the opening words of Section 18 A which lays down that "every application under Section 13-A shall be dealt with in accordance with the procedure specified in this section." This mandate is further reinforced by the next following section i.e. 18-B which reads :-
"Section 18 A or any rule made for |he purpose thereof shall have effect notwithstanding anything inconsistent therewith contained elsewhere in this Act or in any other law for the time being inforce."
Therefore, the order dessrves to be set aside summarily on this score alone.
2. What however impressed the Rent Controller in expressing the above noted opinion is the following sentence occurring in the Supreme Court order :
"There is no need to take a summary procedure since it is a case of additional accommodation "
To me it appears that the Controller has completely mis-interpreted the order of the Supreme Court and has read the above quoted sentence out of context. It is beyond dispute that the matter before the Supreme Court was only with regard to the grant of leave to the respondent to contest the proceedings launched by the petitioner under Section 13-A of the Act. In case, their Lordships of the Supreme Court were of the view that the procedure under Section 18-A has not to be followed in this case, then instead of granting the leave to the respondent the very application of the landlord would have been dismissed, as the suitability of the accommodation io occupation of the landlord is not one of the grounds of eviction as per Section 13 of the Act The grounds for eviction of a tenant, as specified in these two sections, are mutually exclusive of each other. By no stretch of imagination, the words "He does not own and possess any other suitable accommodation in the local area" and "intends to reside" occurring in Section 13-A of the Act be equated with the words "he is not occupying any other residential building in the urban area concerned" and "he requires it for his own occupation", as mentioned in Section 13(3)(a)O) of the Act Section J8A to my mind is a complete cede in itself and lays down the procedure for dealing with an application under Section 13-A of the Act. Therefore there is no question of an application under Section 13-A of the Act being tried as an application under Section 13 of the same.
3. The me of the word 'Summary Procedure* in the above-quoted order of the Supreme Court on which the learned counsel for the respondent has heavily relied to sustain the opinion of the Rent Controller, to my mind, only indicates or refers to that procedure which has to be followed when no permission to contest is granted to a tenant under sub section (4) of Section 18-A of the Act I am of the view that this section lays down two wholly independent procedures to govern two situations : (i) when leave to contest is refused to a tenant and (ii) when such leave is granted. The procedure prescribed in sub-section (4) governs the first situation and the one specified in sub-section (6) apples to the latter. This is so very manifest from a close reading of these two subsections. Therefore, what the above noted order of the Supreme Court ruled out was the procedure prescribed in sub-section (4) of this Section which obviously is a summary procedure as compared to the one laid down in sub-section (6). With the grant of leave to the respondent, by their Lordships of the Supreme Court, the Rent Controller has essentially to follow the procedure prescribed in sub-section (6) of this Section As a matter of fact, two judgments of this Court have, by now, assigned the same meaning and content to the above noted order of the Supreme Court and the judgments are Ravinder Nath v. T. R. Lakhanpal, (1990-2) 98 P.L.R. 140 and K. G. P. Pillai v. Subash Chander Pathanias. (1990-2) P.L.R. 574.
4. I, therefore allow this petition and while setting aside the impugned order of the Rent Controller, direct her to dispose of this petition in the manner provided for in Section 18-Aofthe Act. There is however, no order are to costs.