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Judgment
The lower Appellate Court regarded the defendant as a trespasser and held that he was not entitled to a notice to quit. We are unable to agree
with this conclusion. Exhibit I, which is dated the 14th of May 1910, stipulates for a year certain and provides for yearly payments in case the
lessee continued to hold on. We think that on the expiry of the first year of tenancy, the defendant was continuing as a tenant from year to year
under the provision to hold on. The observation of Lord Alverstone, C.J., in Dixon v. Bradford and District Railway Servants'' Coal Supply Co.
Ltd. (1904) 1 K.B. 444, clearly supports this position. See also Lewis v. Baker (1906) 2 K.B. 599; 95 L.T. 10 and Woodfall''s Landlord and
Tenant, page 254. In Dougal v. McCarthy (1893) 1 Q.B. 736, Lord Esher, M.R., states the law thus: I take it that the doctrine laid down by Lord
Mansfield in Right v. Darby 1 Term. Rep. 159 is correct. He there said: If there be a lease for a year, and, by consent of both parties, the tenant
continue in possession afterwards, the law implies a tacit renovation of the contract. They are supposed to have renewed the old agreement, which
was to hold for a year.''"" We think this principle is applicable to the present case. Mr. Madhavan Nair relied upon Soames v. Nicholson (1902) 1
K.B. 157 and argued that there was a contract to the contrary to the effect that the tenant should deliver possession on demand. But the contract
does not say when the demand should be made. In the absence of such a stipulation, the presumption is that the demand must be to terminate the
tenancy at the end of the term for which the tenant holds. The provision for payment of the rent is to pay it annually and it cannot be split up. Even
granting that at the expiry of the first year, the defendant was a tenant-at-will, as pointed out by Baron Alderson in Pope v. Garland 4 Y. & C.
391; 54 R.R. 492, such a tenant holds from year to year. The decision in Soames v. Nicholson (1902) 1 K.B. 157 turns upon the special term in
the contract that the tenancy can be put an end to at any time. There is no such stipulation in Exhibit I; consequently there is no contract to the
contrary regarding the period when the tenancy should be determined. The decision in Kelu v. Ammad Kully 8 Ind. Cas. 362, to which the learned
Counsel for the respondents drew our attention, does not consider the question whether the demand should not be to quit and deliver before a new
term commences.
We think that the plaintiff is bound to make the demand on the defendant to deliver up possession before the next year of tenancy commences
and as that has not been done in this case, he is not entitled to recover possession. We reverse the decrees of the Courts below and dismiss the
suit with costs throughout.