Runchordas (Private) Ltd. vs Vasanji Ravji Shah

B.N. Banerjee, J.—As between the landlord and the tenant there was some sort of agreement by which the landlord had agreed to supply to the tenant electricity through a sub-meter at the rate of six annas per unit. The tenant thought that the rate was too much and aspired to have direct supply from the Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation Ltd. Since the landlord would not consent thereto, the tenant applied before the Rent Controller u/s 36 of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act. The Rent Controller dismissed the application on the ground that the tenant was getting supply of electricity from the landlord under the agreement and, therefore, there was no refusal or withholding of supply of electricity to the tenant. As against the order of the Rent Controller the tenant appealed before the Appellate authority. The Appellate authority allowed the appeal in the view that even if the tenant was getting supply of electricity from the landlord, that would not prevent him from getting direct supply from the Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation.

Aggrieved by the order of the Appellate authority the landlord moved this Court and obtained this Rule.

Mr. Noni Coomar Chakravarty, learned Counsel for the landlord Petitioner, submitted that so long as the landlord went on supplying electric energy to the tenant, no occasion for an application u/s 36 of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act would arise. In my opinion, in this submission Mr. Chakravarty is not correct. Section 12(2) of the Indian Electricity Act, 1910, used to envisage consent by the owner before the Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation Ltd. could lay down or place any electric supply line in a building. Now, the language of Section 36(1) of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act is:

If a landlord refuses or withholds his consent to the supply of electricity to a tenant, the tenant desiring to get such supply from a licensee, as denned in Clause (h) of Section 2 of the Indian Electricity Act, 1910, may apply to the Controller setting out the scheme for such supply.

On a plain reading of the section, the refusal or withholding is not of electric energy but refusal of consent as is envisaged under Sub-section (2) of Section 12 of the Indian Electricity Act, 1910. This consent was refused by the owner. That attracted the provisions of Section 36 of the West Bengal Premises Tenancy Act against the landlord.

Moreover, now consent is not necessary at all. Sub-section (2) of Section 12 of the Indian Electricity Act, 1910, has been amended by Act 32 of 1959 and the language now stands as follows:

Nothing contained in Sub-section (1) shall be deemed to authorise or empower a licensee, without the consent of the local authority or of the owner or occupier concerned, as the case may be, to lay down or place any electric supply line, or other work in, through or against any building, or on, over or under any land not dedicated to public use whereon, wherever or whereunder any electric supply line or work has not already been lawfully laid down or placed by such licensee.

(Underlined for emphasis).

For all these reasons I do not propose to interfere with the order made by the Appellate authority. This Rule is discharged. Since the other side did not appear before me at the time of the hearing of this Rule, I make no order as to costs.

The application filed in Court on July 31, 1963, is also rejected.