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Showing contexts for: timber in Ismail Dada Bhamani vs Bai Zuleikhabai on 12 November, 1943Matching Fragments
7. Not to use the said demised premises for any purpose other than as timber shops or sheds for the storing of timber or for making furniture and as saw mills and for the purposes incidental thereto provided nevertheless that nothing herein contained shall be deemed to prevent the lessee from occupying a part of the said demised premises as a dwelling house for himself and his family only.
8. To determine whether the subject-matter of a demise is : " let separately for the purpose of being used principally for business or trade ", the lease itself must be the governing factor; but, in my opinion, the lease can be considered and construed in conjunction with the relevant surrounding circumstances, which must be the physical nature of the premises and how they were in fact used at the date of the lease. There is no doubt about this. At the date of the lease the plots of land were used for the storage of timber for profit or gain and not as an adjunct to some private activity. [There was in fact at the date of the lease a business being carried on there. It is true, as pointed out to us by Mr. Desai that the lease does not in terms state the purposes of the letting and does not lay down in mandatory form that any particular trade or business is to be carried on there. But, as is usual with conditions as to user the covenants are couched in negative form, and the question really resolves itself into this : In order to come within the expression : " let for the purpose of business or trade" have you got to find an affirmative assertion of the purposes of user, or can the qualification operate when looking at the covenants in the lease as a whole and with knowledge of the condition of the premises at the date of the lease and its user, it is manifest that the premises demised are business premises and let on terms which insure a continuation of that user ?]
9. In my judgment, this is the correct method of approach to the lease. Clause 5 of the lessee's covenant is merely a restrictive covenant against user of the premises in certain dangerous and other ways. It is Clause 7 which is important. In form this is a negative covenant; but, as pointed out by Mr. Setalvad, it is the form of a double negative : "not to use the demised premises for any purpose other than as timber shops...." It follows that the only permitted purposes are timber shops and the other purposes to which I will revert later. The learned Judge in the Court below dealt with this part of. the case as follows (p. 247 ante):
With great respect to the learned Judge, I think this is putting too narrow a construction on the words of the section. Some assistance is also to be gained by a description of the plots of land in the blue prints annexed to the two leases in which the area in which the plots are situated is described as "the Timber Market". But a further point has been taken, namely, that the other uses to which alone the land may be put, namely : " sheds for the storing of timber or for making furniture and as saw mills and for the purposes incidental thereto ", materially affect the question. In my judgment when Clause (7) is looked at as a whole, starting as it does with " timber shops ", the motive of the letting was business purposes. Nor does the provision about the dwelling house affect the matter; this is subsidiary to the main or principal purpose, and in this respect it is to be noted that the user of the house is limited to the lessee and his family. That being so, in my judgment, the section applies to these premises, and the next question, which arises, is whether the appellant is entitled to the benefit of it. No question arises as to any non-payment of rent. But it is said that he has not performed the other conditions of the tenancy by reason of the breach of the covenant against underletting.
4. The opening words of the covenants of the lease are: "And the lessee doth hereby covenant with the lessors and the mortgagees as follows : " Clause 7, the material covenant, is worded in a double negative form. Making it into a positive sentence it would mean that the lessee covenanted with the lessor to use the said premises only for timber shops or sheds for the storing of timber or for making furniture anti as saw mills and for purposes incidental thereto. But that did not prevent the lessee from occupying a part of the said premises as a dwelling house for himself and his family only. Those words clearly indicate that the plots of land were to be used for the purpose of timber shops, etc. I read the first part of that clause as indicating the principal purpose for which the land let was to be used. The latter part of that clause permitted not the erection but the occupation of a portion of the demised premises as a dwelling house. I do not find in this lease anything to allow a tenant to put up a structure of a permanent nature. The clause, therefore, defines the purpose for which the plot has to be used, and I do not think it is unreasonable to read that clause as meaning that the property has to be used principally for business or trade. It was contended on behalf of the respondent that under this clause the tenant was not obliged to do business. In my opinion, that is not a relevant consideration. The purpose of use is mentioned ; and, although it may not be open to the landlord to compel the tenant to carry on trade, it is equally clear that the letting was in order that the land should be used for the purposes mentioned in the clause. In my opinion therefore the first requirement of Section 11, namely, that the land was let for the purpose of being used principally for business or trade, is fulfilled.