Delhi High Court: In a petition filed under the proviso to Section 25-B(8) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (‘Act’), assailing the order passed by the Additional Rent Controller, Central District, Delhi wherein the application of the petitioners who sought leave to contest the proceedings under Section 14(1)(e) of the Act was dismissed, a Single Judge Bench of Girish Kathpalia, J., upheld the same while stating that there was no infirmity or perversity in the impugned order and that there was no law that stated that the requirement of a rich man had to be presumed to be devoid of bona fide.
Background
In the present matter, the respondent, who claimed himself to be the owner of the subject premises, filed an eviction petition against the petitioners and pleaded that he along with another buyer, had purchased the entire premises from the former owner through a registered sale deed dated 16-05-1985. He also claimed that he subsequently acquired the undivided share of the buyer who purchased the property along with him through a release deed on 16-10-1987.
The deceased mother of the petitioners was inducted as a tenant by the former owner and the subject premises, which had been lying unused and vacant for several years, were now in possession of the petitioners.
The respondent was the Managing Director of a company named JCBL Ltd. in which his wife, son, and daughter were the majority shareholders. The company had earlier operated its business from three different rented properties, each of which they had to vacate one after the other. Thus, the respondent claimed to have a bona fide requirement of the subject premises for commercial use by his company and the business ventures of his daughter and son, and that he had no other reasonably suitable accommodation.
Upon service of summons, the petitioners applied for leave to contest the proceedings before the Additional Rent Controller wherein they contended that the respondent did not have the subject premises repaired despite several requests which caused a financial burden on them and that the respondent had availability of many other premises that could be used by him.
After considering the contentions, reply, and rejoinder for the leave application, the Additional Rent Controller dismissed the application through the impugned eviction order.
Analysis and Decision
The Court analyzed that the core issue in the instant matter was that as per the petitioners, the requirement of the subject premises as projected by the respondent is not bona fide since his children were financially independent and he owns reasonably suitable alternate accommodation.
The Court stated that the petitioner’s argument that the eviction petition deserved to be rejected since the respondent owned alternate suitable accommodations, failed since it was contrary to the record and it was specifically pleaded that the respondent had no other suitable place to operate his business. The Court also stated that such a hyper-technical approach was not sustainable in the eyes of the law.
Further, the Court said even though the daughter was carrying on her business, she had to keep shifting her workplace on account of the expiry of lease periods and that the expression ‘dependent’ had to be construed widely to include not just financial but also emotional dependence and dependence for accommodation.
The Court stated that where the landlord wants to ensure that his children do not have to spend money on rent, his requirement of the subject premises has to be considered to be bona fide, and that the ‘dependence’ in such proceedings has to be interpreted judiciously keeping in mind the intent behind the enactment of the Act, and that for bona fide enjoyment of the tenanted premises, the Act does not confer a superior right on the tenant than that of the landlord.
The Court noted that there was no explicit statement in the Act to describe who is a dependent on the landlord and what constitutes a family. Further, the Court referred to Corpn. of the City of Nagpur v. Nagpur Handloom Cloth Market Co. Ltd., 1963 Supp (2) SCR 796 wherein the Supreme Court held that the expression ‘family’ has a variable connotation according to the context in which it occurs. Therefore, the Court said, that the present case could not be narrowly construed to exclude the gainfully employed daughter and son of the respondent from the scope of bona fide requirement.
Further, the Court referred to its decision in Charanjeet Singh v. Vivek Jain, 2024 SCC OnLine Del 613, and said that a father could not be told not to aid convenience for his son to expand their business just because they would have to cause inconvenience to their tenant.
The Court further noted that the respondent had specifically pleaded that none of the properties mentioned by the petitioners were available to him for use and the petitioners did not place any cogent evidence on record to show otherwise which was required in support of the pleadings as had been discussed in previous cases decided by this Court.
The Court also stated that granting leave to contest merely based on an affidavit of the tenant, the contents of which are denied by the landlord on oath, and pushing the parties to undergo trial would completely negate the sacrosanct principles provided in Chapter III-A of the Act.
The Court noted that the predecessor bench as well as the petitioners took adjournment to obtain instructions for grant of reasonable time to vacate the subject premises on the very first hearing. This showed that they were also not convinced of the merits of the case.
The Court agreed with the respondent that financial affluence of the landlord had no bearing on the proceedings under Section 14(1)(e) of the Act and that no law required that the rich man must be presumed to be devoid of bona fide.
Thus, the Court upheld the impugned order and dismissed the petition while saying that no infirmity or perversity was found in the impugned order which could warrant intervention by this Court.
[Arun Puri v. Rajinder Kumar Aggarwal, 2024 SCC OnLine Del 4017, Decided on 29-05-2024]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For Petitioners — Advocate Vaishalee Mehra
For Respondent — Advocate Bharat Chugh, Advocate Ajatshatru Singh Rawat, Advocate Aditya Narayan Shukla, and Advocate M. Nirvikar Singh
