Vas Dev vs Ashok Kumar

V.K. Jhanji, J.—This is tenant''s revision petition against the order of appellate Authority whereby it set aside the order of Rent Controller, and passed order of ejectment against the tenant The ejectment of the tenant was ordered by the appellate Authority only on the ground or of non-payment of rent.

The landlord (respondent herein) filed an ejectment petition against his tenant (petitioner herein) on the ground that he has failed to pay the arrears of rent w.e.f. 7th April, 1972, upto-date. The ejectment petition was filed on 5-4-1984. On the first date of hearing the tenant made a statement that he has already paid the rent upto 31-12-1982 and therefore, tendered the rent from 1-1-1983 to 31-3-1985 at the rate of Rs. 8/- per month. The landlord had claimed the rent at the rate of Rs. 30/- per month. The Rent Controller dismissed the ejectment petition of the respondent after finding that the rate of rent is Rs. 18/- per month, and not Rs. 30/- per month as claimed by the respondent. The petition for ejectment on the ground of non-payment of rent was rejected merely because that the rent in the petition was being claimed for the period over 12 years and there was no explanation from the side of the landlord- as to why he kept quiet for such a long time, and the version of the tenant that he had already paid the rent was accepted.

On appeal by the landlord-respondent, the appellate Authority set aside the order of Rent Controller and passed an order of ejectment against the tenant, after finding that the tenant failed to prove that the rent claimed to have been paid by him, was actually paid. This order of the appellate Authority has been impugned by the tenant in the present revision petition.

Learned counsel for the petitioner contended that the respondent-landlord has not come to the Court with clean hands as he claimed in the ejectment petition the rent at the rate of Rs. 30/- per month, whereas, the rate of rent was Rs. 18/- per month, therefore, the ejectment petition deserves to be dismissed. In support of his arguments he relied upon judgment of this Court reported as Mehar Singh v. Tilak Raj 1981 (2) R. C. R. 657, Raj Kumar v. Ram Parkash 1981 (2) R. C. R. 480, and Chander Kumar Anand v. Daropadi Devi 1988 (2) R. C. R. 638.

On the other hand, learned counsel for the respondents submitted that the appellate Authority after appreciating the entire evidence on record, rightly passed an order of ejectment against the tenant.

I have heard the learned counsel for the parties at length and have also gone through the record.

According to the respondent-landlord, the rent was due for nearly about 12 years whereas, according to the petitioner-tenant, the rent was paid to the respondent-landlord. In view of the plea of tenant that he had been paying the rent regularly to the landlord and no amount with regard to rent was due from his side at the time of filing of ejectment petition, it was for the tenant to prove that he was not in arrears of rent. The tenant while appearing in the witness-box admitted that he always paid the rent against receipt, but strangely enough, no receipt for the rent is claimed to have been paid by the tenant has been produced on record. The respondent-landlord himself! has placed on record the Rent-deed (R-l) persual of which shows that as and when the rent was paid, an entry to that effect was made at the back of the said Rent-note, but there is no entry with regard to payment of rent for the period as claimed by the tenant. Therefore the plea of the tenant was rightly negatived by the appellate Authority The judgment in Mehar Singh''s case (supra). Raj Kumar''s case (supra) and Chander Kumar Anand''s case (supra), relied upon by learned counsel for the petitioner have no application to the facts of present case because the same were decided on the basis of fact of each case.

Consequently, the revision petition is dismissed with no order as to costs. However, the petitioner is allowed three month''s time to vacate the premises provided he deposits the entire arreares of rent within one month from today, including that of three months, and also files an undertaking with the Rent Controller to the effect that he shall hand over the vacant possession of the premises after the expiry of afore-said period.