SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
S. MURTAZA FAZAL ALI, A. VARADARAJAN AND A.N. SEN, JJ.
Bholaram, Appellant
Versus
Ameerchand, Respondent.
Civil Appeal No. 1603 (N) of 1971, D/- 13-3-1981.
Code of Civil Procedure,1908 - Section 100 - Suit for ejectment – Rent – Notice - Appeal against a judgment of Madhya Pradesh High Court by which High Court interfered in second appeal and after having set aside the findings of fact by trial Court and the appellate Court decreed plaintiffs suit for ejectment - We have gone through judgment of High Court as also of courts below and we find that by and large High Court seems to have reversed concurrent findings of fact arrived at by trial Court and the appellate Court and, therefore, prima facie travelled beyond limits imposed on its jurisdiction under S. 100 of Code of Civil Procedure - High Court, however, seems to have justified its interference in second appeal mainly on ground that the judgements of courts below were perverse and were given in utter disregard of important materials on record particularly misconstruction of rent note - Held, A perusal of the contents of the notice manifestly shows that the defendant had made a complaint amongst other matters, also in regard to the damage done to the kitchen which really formed the old room on the first floor which existed even before the other two rooms were added in year 1963 by reconstructing the upper portion of the house - A correct interpretation of words extracted by High Court in its judgment from rent note shows that what was really let out to defendant was a room on ground floor and entire upper floor including reconstructed portion - There is no averment in rent note that out of reconstructed house only two rooms on upper portion of first floor minus old construction was rented out to appellant-defendant - We are, therefore, satisfied that High Court erred both on law and on facts in interfering with judgments of courts below and in holding that balcony and the old room, which has been referred to by defendant as kitchen, did not form part of tenanted premises of appellant - Appeal allowed.
Judgment
FAZAL ALI, J. :- This appeal by special leave by the defendant is directed against a judgment dated July 21, 1971 of the Madhya Pradesh High Court by which the High Court interfered in second appeal and after having set aside the findings of fact by the trial Court and the appellate Court decreed the plaintiffs suit for ejectment. We have gone through the judgment of the High Court as also of the courts below and we find that by and large the High Court seems to have reversed the concurrent findings of fact arrived at by the trial Court and the appellate Court and, therefore, prima facie travelled beyond the limits imposed on its jurisdiction under S. 100 of the Code of Civil Procedure. The High Court, however, seems to have justified its interference in second appeal mainly on the ground that the judgements of the courts below were perverse and were given in utter disregard of the important materials on the record particularly misconstruction of the rent note. Even if we accept the main reason given by the High Court the utmost that could be said was that the findings of fact by the courts below were wrong or grossly inexcusable but that by itself would not entitle the High Court to interfere in the absence of a clear error of law,
2. Even so, after going through the documents and evidence produced by the parties we are unable to agree with the conclusion arrived at by the High Court.
3. The plaintiffs case was that by virtue of a rent note dated June 3, 1963 (Ext. P-1) he had rented out the premises in question, being House No. 1205, Ganjipura Ward, Lordganj. Jabalpur, to the defendant at a rental of Rs. 205/- per month. The plaintiff averred that originally the premises let out were only a room on the ground floor and the newly constructed portion on the first floor which consisted of two rooms as shown in the map as E F G H. The plaintiffs case was that there was an old room on the first floor, shown in the map as I J K L, which was not the subject-matter of the tenancy, but appears to have been encroached upon by the defendant-tenant subsequently sometime in July 1966. This encroachment was, therefore, one of the grounds on which ejectment was sought.
3-A. Another ground for ejectment was that the defendant had defaulted in the payment of rent as a result of which arrears of Rs. 232.33 had fallen due up to the date of the suit. We might state here that so far as the around of arrears or default of rent is concerned, that was negatived by the Civil Judge and the District Judge and this finding of fact has been fully affirmed by the High Court. We are, therefore, left only with the solitary ground for ejectment relating to the encroachment on the room, shown by letters I J K L made by the tenant after the lease by which he committed a breach of the terms of tenancy and made himself liable to ejectment under the provisions of the Madhya Pradesh Accommodation Control Act, 1961.
4. Thus, the pivotal controversy in this appeal centres on the question as to the exact nature of the terms on which the premises were let out to the defendant-tenant and made part of the tenancy. The relevant portion of the rent note, Ext. P-1, may be extracted thus :
"I take your house bearing present Corporation No. 1205 situate at Ganjipura Ward, Lord Ganj, City of Jabalpur, which you have got constructed double storeved in the year 1963, with effect from 10th June, 1963, according to English Calendar, on reasonable monthly rent of Rs. 205/- (in words Rs. Two hundred and five).....That I shall open a shop in the block of the ground floor of the house and I shall reside in the upper portion of the house."
5. It would be pertinent to note that in the first preamble of the rent note which describes the property leased there is absolutely no mention that only two rooms on the first floor were let out to the defendant. The admitted position seems to be that the first floor was reconstructed by the plaintiff by which two rooms were added and one old ro
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