(1.) THIS first appeal is at the instance of a landlord in a suit for eviction on the ground of reasonable requirement and is directed against the judgment and decree dated 19th August, 1999 passed by the learned Judge, 4th Bench, City Civil Court at Calcutta in Ejectment suit No. 219 of 1991 thereby dismissing the suit on the ground of absence of valid notice of ejectment upon all the tenants. The learned Trial Judge, however, found that the plaintiff otherwise proved reasonable requirement.

(2.) BEING dissatisfied, the plaintiff has come up with the present first appeal.

(3.) IT appears from the record that the plaintiff, a subsequent purchaser from the previous landlord, filed the suit for eviction on the ground of reasonable requirement against one Salil Kumar Dasgupta by describing him as the sole tenant in respect of the tenanted property. There is no dispute that when the plaintiff purchased the property from the previous landlord, a suit for eviction against the said Salil Kumar Dasgupta was pending but such suit was withdrawn as the transferee landlord was not entitled to get the benefit of section 13 (ff) of the West Bengal Premises tenancy Act within three years from the date of purchase.

(4.) SUBSEQUENTLY, by giving a fresh notice to quit, the plaintiff-appellant filed the suit for eviction against the said Salil Kumar Dasgupta on the ground of reasonable requirement out of which the present appeal arises.

(5.) SALIL Kumar Dasgupta, the sole defendant, after entering appearance in the suit filed an application under section 17 (2) of the West Bengal premises Tenancy Act but did not dispute the relationship of landlord and tenant between the parties as alleged in the plaint; subsequently, however, in the written statement, he took specific plea that he was not the sole tenant as his father was the original tenant and on the death of his father, he along with two other brothers inherited the property.

(6.) AFTERWARDS, the heirs of one of such brothers came up with an application under Order 1 Rule 10 of the Code of Civil Procedure for being added as the defendants alleging that they were co-tenants in respect of the property and as such, in their absence the suit was not maintainable.

(7.) THE learned Trial Judge allowed such application and added the heirs of one of the other brothers of the original defendant.

(8.) THE plea taken by the added defendants was that one Sashanka Sekhar dasgupta was the original tenant in respect of the property and on his death in the year 1974, his three sons, namely, Sushil Kumar Dasgupta, Sunil Kumar Dasgupta and Salil Kumar Dasgupta became the tenants in respect of the property and thus the suit filed by impleading Salil Kumar Dasgupta alone was hot maintainable.

(9.) AT the time of hearing of the suit, the added defendants produced rent receipts granted by the predecessor-in-interest of the plaintiff-appellant in favour of Sashanka Sekhar Dasgupta in support of their claim and asserted their actual possession over the suit property.

(10.) IT may not be out of place to mention here that even after the heirs of one of the other brothers were added as parties, the plaintiff-landlord stuck to the original case made out in the plaint that Salil Kumar Dasgupta was the sole tenant and did not care to add the other left out brother of Salil.

(11.) AS indicated earlier, the learned Trial Judge, by relying upon the rent receipts in favour of Sashanka Sekhar Dasgupta, arrived at the conclusion that the tenancy continued after the death of Sashanka and thus, his three sons became the tenants in respect of the property and, therefore, notice of eviction given by the plaintiff by describing Salil as the sole tenant was illegal and as such, the suit filed on the basis of such a notice was not maintainable.

(12.) MR. Chakraborty, the learned Advocate appearing on behalf of the appellant has emphatically contended before us that there was surrender of tenancy after the death of Sash