The month of the tenancy is determined by the agreement between the parties, and in the absence of an agreement, it is determined by the custom or usage of the locality.

( 1 ) THIS is the defendant's appeal against a decree for ejectment. The facts lie within a short compass and the dispute also is confined to two points.

( 2 ) THE subject-matter of the suit is premises No. 7, Prannath Pandit Street. It was purchased by the plaintiff on 3-12-1946, from its then owner Kalidas Mukherjee. The defendant was a tenant under Kalidas. He was in occupation of the disputed premises as such tenant at the date of the plaintiff's purchase. The defendant's tenancy commenced under a registered lease, dated 7-4-1945. It was for a term of one year. The defendant, however, held over under Kalidas on the expiry of his said lease and, when the plaintiff made her purchase, this tenancy of the defendant by holding over was in force. By a notice to quit, served in January 1950, the plaintiff asked the defendant to vacate the premises on the expiry of 7-4-1951, and make over vacant possession to her on and from the 8th and the defendant having defaulted to comply with the said notice, the plaintiff brought the present suit on 9-4-1951.

( 3 ) IN the plaint the plaintiff, after stating that the defendant's tenancy had been duly determined by the aforesaid notice to quit, went on to allege, inter alia, that she reasonably required the suit promises for her own occupation and so the Rent Control Act of 1950, which was in force when the suit was instituted, would not afford any protection to the defendant and would not bar the plaintiff's suit. No other allegation in the plaint is material for our present purpose.

( 4 ) THE principal defence was a denial of the validity of the notice to quit and of the plaintiff's case of reasonable requirement.

( 5 ) THE trial court overruled all the defence and decreed the plaintiif's suit. The lower appellate Court affirmed that decision.

( 6 ) THE point is whether the decree for ejectment has been rightly made.

( 7 ) IN support of the appeal two contentions were urged by Mr. Mukherjee. These were the two contentions before the lower appellate Court also and the main defence in the trial Court. The first contention challenged the validity of the notice to quit. The second questioned the genuineness of the plaintiff's plea of reasonable requirement and also its sufficiency under the law when tested on the touchstone of comparative advantage and disadvantage, as required under the Proviso to Section 12 (1) (h) of the Rent Control Act of, 1950.

( 8 ) TO this second question in both its parts, the answer is short and simple and we shall dispose of it first.

( 9 ) IT has been proved beyond doubt that the plaintiff with her family of 22 members lives in a rented house at Howrah under a threat of ejectment. When the present suit was pending in the trial court, an ejectment suit was pending against the plaintiff herself at the instance of her landlord in respect of the above rented house at Howrah. That suit, it is admitted, has since been decreed. It has also been proved that the plaintiff purchased the disputed house for purposes of residence. Along with these broad facts, other relevant circumstances have been fully considered by the two Courts below and they have agreed in holding that the plaintiff has amply proved her case of reasonable requirement of the disputed house for the occupation of herself and her family and satisfied the test of comparative advantage and disadvantage.

( 10 ) ON the materials on record, we have no reason to differ from that concurrent finding. We, accordingly, reject the appellant's submission on this point.

( 11 ) THE dispute as to the validity of the notice appears to be more fundamental, at any rate, more substantial, but here also the appellant, in our opinion, cannot succeed.

( 12 ) THE notice, as we have said above, expired with the expiry of 7-4-1951. The question is whether it expired with a month of the tenancy.

( 13 ) IT is necessary then to find out what was the month of the defendant's tenancy at the time of the noti