Judgment

KRISHNA IYER, J.: (For himself and on behalf of M. H. Beg, J.):- Calcutta or Cochin, for the urban people of India, the shocking scarcity of a roof to rest one s tired bones is an unhappy problem of social justice that compels enactment of control of rent and eviction laws. In the case now before us, attacking the constitutionality of legislation handcuffing the landlord-proprietariat s right of eviction, the law has to be tested not merely by the cold print of Art, 19 (1) (f) but also by the public concern of Art. 19 (5) and the compassionate animus of Article.39. Parts III and IV of the Constitution together constitute a complex of promises the nation has to keep and the legislation challenged before us is in partial fulfilment of this tryst with the people. These observations become necessary in limine since counsel for the respondents dismissed the concept of social justice as extraneous to an insightful understanding of the section invalidated by the High Court, while we think that judicial conscience is not a mere matter of citations of precedents but of activist appraisal of social tears to wipe out which the state is obligated under the Constitution.

2. The two appea