Research › Search › Judgment

Rajasthan High Court · body

2017 DIGILAW 1783 (RAJ)

Jagmaal v. Chandrashekhar

2017-08-09

ALOK SHARMA

body2017
JUDGMENT : Alok Sharma, J. 1. Under challenge is the impugned judgment dated 23.06.2017 passed by the Appellate Rent Tribunal, Jhunjhunu (hereinafter ‘Appellate Tribunal’) setting aside the judgment dated 19.07.2016 passed by the Rent Tribunal, (hereinafter ‘Tribunal’) and on consideration of the evidence on record allowing the respondent-tenant's (hereinafter ‘the tenant’) application under Section 11 of the Rajasthan Rent Control Act, 2001 (hereinafter ‘the Act of 2001’) and directing that he unlawfully dispossessed from the tenanted premises by the respondent-landlord (hereinafter ‘the landlord’) be put back in possession thereof. 2. Perused the material available on record of the petition. 3. Admittedly vide rent note dated 01.06.2009, the tenant was put into possession of the tenanted premises by the landlord. The landlord could not lead any evidence so as to how the tenant having lawfully come into possession of the tenanted premises was lawfully dispossessed therefrom. Further there was evidence on record to show that the inventory of the goods of the tenant in the tenanted premises was drawn and even on the landlord's own admission the premises had a double lock, one belonging to the landlord and the other to the tenant. 4. Mr. B.L. Agarwal appearing for the landlord sought to emphasize the pleadings of the tenant in his petition stating that on 30.05.2011 he was at the shop till late into the night to ward of the landlord's threats of dispossessing him and when he returned the following morning he found himself locked out with his lock over the shop on rent having been broken and replaced by one belonging to the landlord with regard whereto a FIR was filed. Mr. B.L. Agarwal submitted on his own say the tenant was dispossessed on 30.05.2011 but filed the petition only on 23.07.2011, after about 52 days which was clearly beyond the limitation of 30 days for laying the suit for possession under Section 11 of the Act of 2001. It was submitted that the Rent Tribunal in the circumstances rightly found valid the objection of the landlord that the tenant's suit for repossession was hit by limitation. This, aside of the Rent Tribunal also finding no merits in the tenant's case otherwise. Mr. B.L. Agarwal submitted that the Appellate Tribunal committed a patently illegality in holding to the contrary and to the tenant's detriment both on the issue of limitation in filing the suit for possession and its merits. This, aside of the Rent Tribunal also finding no merits in the tenant's case otherwise. Mr. B.L. Agarwal submitted that the Appellate Tribunal committed a patently illegality in holding to the contrary and to the tenant's detriment both on the issue of limitation in filing the suit for possession and its merits. 5. Mr. R.K. Agarwal Senior Counsel appearing for the tenant submitted that wholistically construed the pleadings in the suit for possession filed by the tenant indicated that the tenant was in possession upto a day prior to 01.07.2011. A typographical error in the plaint stating 30.05.2011 instead of 30.06.2011 was of no event. The Rent Tribunal had taken a very pedantic and disjointed view of the pleadings in holding that the tenant had admitted that he was dispossessed the day following 30.05.2011 and the suit for possession under Section 11 of the Act of 2001 having been filed on 23.07.2011 it was beyond limitation. On merits, Mr. R.K. Agarwal submitted that the tenant was admittedly put into possession of the tenanted property by the landlord and hence was for the landlord and his burden to produce evidence before the Trial Court as to how he retrieved possession in accordance with law from the tenant. Aside of failing on this count, Mr. R.K. Agarwal submitted, the landlord willy-nilly also admitted to the tenant's forced exclusion from the tenanted premises when the inventory of the tenant's goods in the premises was drawn by the police on the tenant's compliant and that on the tenanted premises besides the tenant's lock his own had lock was also put. Nothing perverse in the construction of the plaint or appreciation of evidence on record by the Appellate Tribunal can be found. It was submitted that the Appellate Tribunal rightly found that the tenant was threatened of being dispossessed on 30.06.2011 and thereafter unlawfully dispossession from tenanted premises on 01.07.2011. 6. Heard. 7. I am of the considered view that in the facts of the case the Appellate Tribunal correctly held from the evidence on record that the tenant had taken his proceeding by way of a suit for possession under Section 11 of the Act of 2001 within the period of limitation and proved from his evidence that he was unlawfully dispossessed from the tenanted premises on 01.07.2011. The Appellate Tribunal's conclusion aside of being one of fact arrived at on appreciation of evidence, which brooks no interference in a petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India is also liable to be sustained as the landlord did not lead any evidence of probative worth as was his burden to show how he came back into possession in accordance with law after first having put the tenant in possession of the tenanted premises under the admitted rent note dated 01.06.2009. 8. This petition impugning the Appellate Rent Tribunal's judgment dated 23.06.2017 is accordingly dismissed. 9. The court had noted with concern that the tenant has been out of possession, to which he in law is entitled, since 01.07.2011. Now that a final judgment to put him back in possession obtains, it is expected that on an execution application being filed it would be disposed of within a period of 8 weeks of its filing/submission of a certified copy of this order.