JUDGMENT : Sudhir Agarwal, J. Heard Sri A.N. Bhargava, Advocate, for appellant and Sri V.P. Varshney, Advocate, for respondent. 2. This is plaintiff's appeal under Section 100 Code of Civil Procedure arising from judgment and decree dated 23.12.1978 passed by Sri R.C. Verma, 3rd Additional District Judge, Aligarh insofar as it has allowed defendant's appeal partly against judgment and decree dated 29.05.1971 passed by Sri V.K. Sirkar, Munsif Koil, District Aligarh whereby suit was decreed in its entirely. 3. Original Suit No. 170 of 1968 was instituted by Harish Chandra, plaintiff, seeking ejectment of defendant from ground floor of house details whereof were given at bottom of plaint and for realization of Rs. 181.25 as arrears of rent, damages since 01.12.1966 to 19.03.1968, Rs. 43.75 as arrears of rent of water tax and also for pendente lite and future mesne profits at the rate of Rs. 52.50 per month. Defendant-respondent preferred Civil Appeal No. 243 of 1971 wherein Point for Determination No. 3 was in respect to validity of notice of termination of tenancy and the said issue read as under: "(3) Whether the defendant was served with a valid notice as alleged?" 4. Answering the aforesaid Point No.-3, Lower Appellate Court (hereinafter referred to as "LAC") held that no valid notice was served upon defendant-appellant, hence suit for ejectment could not have been decreed and consequently judgment and decree of Trial Court was reversed insofar as it decreed the suit for ejectment. It is this part of judgment of LAC where against plaintiff has come to this Court in this appeal. 5. This appeal was admitted on the single substantial question of law, which reads as under: "(i) Whether the notice would be deemed to have been served on the defendant and the reversal of the judgment of the Trial Court by the Lower Appellate Court is illegal?" 6. It is not in dispute that a notice dated 05.02.1968 was sent through an Advocate, Sri Beni Ram Gupta. It was received back with postal endorsement of "Refusal". It was argued before Court below that notice sent by registered post raises a presumption of service unless defendant produces Postman to prove that it was never offered to him and he never refused to receive it. Defendant on oath stated before Court below that he never refused to accept any registered notice as it was never offered to him. 7. Defendant on oath stated before Court below that he never refused to accept any registered notice as it was never offered to him. 7. In para-7 of written statement, defendant-respondent pleaded as under: ^^7- ;g fd oknh dk dksbZ uksfVl ckcr vnk;xh fdjk;k o [kkyh djus edku dHkh ugha feyk A c;ku oknh f[kykQ blds drbZ xyr o >wB gS A** "7. That no notice on behalf of plaintiff in respect of payment of rent and for vacating the house was received. statement of plaintiff contrary to it, is incorrect and false." (English Translation by Court) 8. In the deposition as DW-1, defendant-respondent Jay Narain Varshney, has categorically denied of having been sought to be served any notice for ejectment. When a statement has been given on oath, in such a case onus lies upon plaintiff to prove that notice was sought to be served upon defendant, but he actually refused to receive the same. 9. Considering a similar issue, this Court in Brij Nandan Gupta Vs. 3rd Additional District Judge, Rampur and others, (2012) 94 AllLR 593, in para-23, 24, 25 and 26 said as under: "23. Thus onus lie upon the landlord to prove his case by producing the best evidence. Under the Post Office Act, if addresser of a registered letter makes enquiry from Post Office about service of registered letter upon addressee, he could have received a reply therefrom and that could have been an evidence of service of notice. Similarly, the Postman could have been examined by summoning him. Unfortunately the landlord has chosen to follow non of these. 24. Learned counsel for the petitioner has relied on Apex Court's decision in Samittri Devi & Anr. Vs. Sampuran Singh & Anr., (2011) 3 SCC 556 . The Court has observed therein that a letter if sent on a correct address and its certificate of posting has been received from the Post Office, presumption can be drawn that in normal course of business it would have been served upon the addressee in absence of any pleading alleging anything otherwise in respect to the certificate of posting or denial of the addressee about its service. The Apex Court relied and referred to an earlier decision of the Privy Council in Harihar Banerji Vs. Ramsashi Roy, (supra) and Full Bench judgment of this Court in Ganga Ram Vs. Phulwati, (1970) AIR Allahabad 446. The Apex Court relied and referred to an earlier decision of the Privy Council in Harihar Banerji Vs. Ramsashi Roy, (supra) and Full Bench judgment of this Court in Ganga Ram Vs. Phulwati, (1970) AIR Allahabad 446. The question of presumption under Section 114 in this case is not the core issue in the matter. Moreover the Court also said that service if denied by addressee the position would be different. But here is a case where addressee has specifically come up with a case that he was never served with the alleged notice and has sworn the above statement on oath. It is in this background the question is whether presumption of service is conclusive or it is so strong that a bare denial of tenant is not sufficient unless he further prove it. Obviously a negative fact would not be required to be proved. In such cases, in absence of anything further, the landlord would have to prove the factum of service of notice by adducing positive evidence since presumption under Section 114 is rebuttable. The aforesaid judgment therefore lends no help to the petitioner since there was no denial of service of notice by the addressee." (emphasis added) 10. In the present case, except producing the envelope containing endorsement of "Refusal" to rebut the evidence of defendant-respondent that he did not receive any such notice, no evidence was adduced by plaintiff-appellant and none has been placed before this Court at the time of hearing of this appeal. 11. In view thereof, LAC has rightly held that there was no valid service of notice for termination of tenancy upon defendant-respondent, hence decree of ejectment could not have been passed. The question formulated above is answered in favour of defendant-respondent and against plaintiff-appellant. 12. The appeal is accordingly dismissed.