1. The petitioners/defendants impugn the order passed by the Judge, Small Causes Court, allowing the application of the plaintiff seeking inspection of the suit premises along with its representatives/Architect/surveyors and other professionals for taking measurements, filed under Section 28 of the Maharashtra Rent Act.

2. The plaintiff is the landlord and the defendants/present Tapadia RR /B.906 petitioners are the tenants of the suit premises. The plaintiff has filed a suit bearing R.A.E. Suit No.150/208 of 2010 seeking vacant and peaceful possession of the suit premises from the defendants by invoking Section 16(1)(i) of the Maharashtra Rent Control Act, 1999, (hereinafter referred to as 'Rent Act of 1999' for the sake of brevity) ie seeking recovery of possession of the suit premises reasonably and bonafidely for demolition and reconstruction as envisaged under section 16(1)(i) of the Act of 1999. As per the said Act, the plaintiff has to give an undertaking as prescribed under Section 16(6)(d) of the said Act. One of the undertakings that is required to be given is that Plans and estimates for the new building or new floor or floors to be erected by the landlord include premises for each tenant with carpet area equivalent to the area of the premises in his occupation in the building sought to be demolished subject to a variation of 5 percent in the area.

3. According to the plaintiff, the area in occupation of the present petitioner no.1/defendant no.1 is 200 sq.ft. and that of petitioner no.2/defendant no.4 is 730 sq.ft., whereas, according to the defendants, the area in occupation of petitioner no.1/defendant no.1 is 203.50 sq.ft and that of petitioner no.2/defendant no.4 is 1565 sq.ft.

4. Before adducing the examination-in-chief, the plaintiff filed the instant application invoking section 28 of the Rent Act of 1999 seeking inspection of the suit premises along with its representatives for carrying out measurements. The said application is allowed. Aggrieved thereby, the present petition.

5. Mr. A.Y. Sakhre, the learned senior counsel for the petitioners, during the course of his erudite arguments, put forth the following propositions.

(i) The concept of inspection and measurements are distinct from each other. 'Inspection' relates to ascertaining the quality, condition or authenticity of an item, product, etc, whereas measurement relates to ascertaining the extent or quantity of something. The learned senior counsel relies on definition of 'inspection and

measurement' as laid down in Oxford English Dictionary and Law of Lexicon.

(ii) Section 28 of the Rent Act of 1999 permits a landlord to only inspect the premises and does not entitle the landlord to carry out measurements. According to the learned senior counsel, the language of the section is clear and unambiguous and the term 'inspection' can be and ought to be interpreted on the basis of its plain meaning and does not require any external aid for interpretation. The literal interpretation of the said section is unambiguous and does not give rise to any absurdity, and so, no question arises of purposively interpreting the term or the provision. To buttress his submissions, the learned senior counsel relies on the Judgment of the Apex Court in a case of Kanai Lal Sur Vs. Paramnidhi Sadhukhan, reported in AIR 1957 Supreme Court 907 and in a case of Satheedevi Vs Prasanna reported in AIR 2010 Supreme Court 2777 and the Judgment of the Apex Court in a case of Gurudevdatta VKSSS Maryadit Vs. State of Maharashtra, reported in AIR 2001 Supreme Court 1980. According to the learned senior counsel, the cardinal principles of interpretation of statute is that the words of a statute must be understood in their natural ordinary or popular sense and construed according to their grammatical meaning and that is the golden rule of interpretation. In the present case, the grammatical meaning of the word 'inspection' appearing in the provision is 'not capable of any ot