Judgement

SABYASACHI MUKHARJI,J. :- This is an appeal by the tenant against the judgment and order of the High Court of Tamil Nadu. By the aforesaid judgment the High Court upheld the landlords contention of bona fide requirement of the premises in question for the business of his sons and maintained the order of eviction passed by the courts below. So far as the question of bona fide need is concerned it has been upheld by the courts below and that finding is not assailed before us. But what was contended was that the application itself under S. 10(3)(a)(iii) of the Tamil Nadu Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act, 1960, hereinafter called the Act was not maintainable as the requirement of the land was not for the landlord or members of his family as such but for two sons who were running a leather business in partnership with strangers. The deed of partnership was examined by the High Court but it is, however, not before us. It appears from the evidence that previously the father and the two sons used to carry on leather business from long time. The sons went into the partnership with others and two of the sons are partners. They jointly hold half the shares. From the evidence it appears that the sons used to take active part even before the partnership started in the leather business, carried on by the father. Thereafter, the partnership firm with the other partners carried on the business. We must proceed on the basis that the partnership deed was silent as to what role the sons of the landlord would perform in this. The only question which was urged before us was that the application for eviction under S. 10(3)(a)(iii) of the Act was liable to be dismissed solely on the ground that the landlord has chosen to file this application to accommodate a partnership firm in which his sons and some strangers are partners and it is not in conformity with the provisions of S. 10(3)(a)(iii) of the said Act. Partnership, as is well settled has a compendious way of describing those who constitute the firm under S. 4 of the Partnership Act. Now, if that is the position, in our opinion, if a person carries on a business along with other partners and it was the other partner who actually carried on the business the position perhaps would have been entirely different. If the same were only sleeping partners that would have been different. On the contrary, here having regard on the past conduct of the sons and having regard to the shares this was their only application where sons were carrying on the business along with other partner. If that is the position in our opinion under S. 10(3)(a)(iii) of the Act as the sons and members of the family carrying on the business in terms of the section will be entitled to the benefit of eviction.

2. Our attention was drawn to a decision of this Court in D. N. Sanghavi & Sons v. Ambalal Tribhuvan Das, (1974) 3 SCR 55 : (AIR 1974 SC 1026) where the meaning of the expression his business under S. 12(1)(f) of the Madhya Pradesh Accommodation Control Act, 1961 came up for consideration. The said section was in pari materia with the present section. Therefore this court held that the meaning of the expression his business under S. 12(1)(f) of the said Act is to be determined by the examination of the object of the Act and setting of the phrase his business. There Dwivedi, J. speaking for the court found that before the partnership, it was stated that the father was to run the shop. Father died during the pendency of the suit and neither of these two passages nor anywhere else in the facts during the pendency had stated that on the terms of the partnership they were entitled to manage the partnership business or even that would also occupy the suit accommodation along with his other partners on obtaining possession from the appellant was not stated that the other partners have agreed to shift the business. The court observed that if the deed of partnership had excluded the son expressly or impliedly from the