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3. Thereafter the provision of Sub-section enumerates the grounds upon which an order might be made for recovery of possession, inter alia, including arrears of rent, bona fide requirement of the landlord etc., being the usual grounds upon which such applications were permissible in various Rent Acts in the country. It was contended that the order under revision should not have directed the petitioners to deliver possession because the decree vested certain rights upon the landlord. It is, therefore, necessary to appreciate the significance of the effect of Section 21 of the Act. It is, therefore, necessary to properly construe Sub-section (1) of Section 21 of the Act. In this connection one has to bear in mind the definition of tenant. Sub-section (1) of Section 21 provides that no order or decree shall be made in favour of the landlord against the tenant. Section 3(r) defines the tenant as a person by whom or on whose account rent is payable for a premises and includes the surviving spouse or any son or daughter or father or mother of a deceased tenant who had been living with the tenant in the premises as a member of the tenant's family up to the death of the tenant and a person continuing in possession after the termination of the tenancy in his favour, but does not include a person placed in occupation of a premises by its tenant or a person to whom the collection of rents or fees in a public market, cart-stand or slaughter house or of rents for shops has been farmed out or leased by a local authority. It has to be borne in mind that the definition of tenant under the Act does not include any person against whom a decree for possession has been passed or against whom the decree for execution for possession has been executed. The High Court was of the view that Sub-section (1) of Section 21 prohibits the court from making any order or decree for recovery of possession in favour of landlord irrespective of any other law of contract between the parties. The High Court concluded that any order of eviction passed before the coming into operation of Section 21 of the Act does not become in operative after coming into operation of the Sub-section. It only prevented passing of any order or decree for eviction after coming into operation of the Act except on the specified grounds mentioned in the proviso to Sub-section (1) of Section 21 of the Act. The Sub-section does not prevent the execution of the order after coming into operation of the Act, of any order decree passed before the coming into operation of the Act.

4. It was held by this Court in Mani Subrat Jain v Raja Ram Vohra 1980 (2) SCR 141 dealing with Section 2(1) of East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act which defines 'tenant' more or less in similar term as the present Act that in view of such a definition of the 'tenant' in Rent Control Act the fact that by the time the Act came into force a decree or any other process extinguished the tenancy under the general law of real property does not terminate the status of a tenant so long as he continues in possession and his possession cannot be terminated except as provided for in the Rent Control Act. It is well-settled legal principle that Rent Control legislations being beneficial to the tenant have to be given a liberal interpretation. While ordinarily substantive rights should not be held to be taken away except by express provision, or clear implication in the case of Rent Control Act, it being a beneficial legislation the provision which confers immunity to the tenant against eviction by the landlord though prospective in form operates to take away the right vested in the landlord by a decree of a court which has become final, unless there is express provision or clear implication to the contrary.