Deposit of rent on the next working day after the stipulated date due to a holiday is considered valid. An appeal by one co-tenant against an eviction order is competent even if other co-tenants are not impleaded as respondents.

( 1 ) THIS is second appeal by the tenant is directed against the judgment dated 6-2-1931 passed by the Rent Control Tribunal, Delhi whereby his appeal was dismissed on two grounds. Firstly, on the ground that he had failed to comply with the order passed under Section 15 (1) of the Delhi Rent Control Act inasmuch as he had deposited the rent for the month of April, 1977 on 16th May, 1977 while he was expected to deposit the same on or before 15th of May, 1977. The second ground being that the appeal filed by him against the order of the Additional Rent Controller was incompetent inasmuch as he had failed to implead cotenants within the period of limitation.

( 2 ) THE respondent-landlord instituted a petition for eviction of the tenant under Section 14 (1) provisos (a), (c) and (j) of the Delhi Rent Control Act. It is not necessary to deal with clauses (c) and (j) because the same were decided against the landlord and were not pressed before the Rent Control Tribunal. During the course of proceedings, the Additional Rent Controller passed an order on 27-10-1976 under Section 15 (1) of the Act directing the tenant to pay or deposit the arrears of rent from 1st March, 1974 upto the date of the order at the rate of Rs. 9. 00 per month within one month and further to continue to pay or deposit the future rent month by month by the 15th of each succeeding month at the same rate. In compliance with the said order, the tenant deposited the arrears of rent on 26-11-1976, which was admittedly within the stipulated time. The rent upto March, 1977 was also admittedly paid within the time stipulated. The dispute is only regarding the rent paid for the month of April, 1977. The said rent was paid on 16-5-1977 and from this date, it was concluded by the Additional Rent Controller as also by the Tribunal that the rent having been deposited beyond the 15th day of the month was obviously not in accordance with the order and as such, there was a default.

( 3 ) IT has been brought to my notice that 14-5-1977 was a second Saturday and thus a holiday and 15-5-1977 being Sunday, the rent could not be deposited and as such, the rent was deposited on 16-5-1977. The learned Tribunal as also the Additional Rent Controller have not taken into consideration the provisions of Section 10 of the General Clauses Act according to which if the last day happens to be a holiday, the act done on the next day would be considered to have been done or taken in due time if it is done or taken on the next day afterwards on which the court or office is open. 15th May, 1977 being Sunday, the deposit made on 16-5-1977 has therefore to be held as valid.

( 4 ) AS regards the second ground, it is not disputed that the decree of eviction was passed against the appellant and four others One of those four persons has since died and his legal representatives were also brought on record when the proceedings were pending before the Additional Rent Controller. The appellant while filing the appeal before the Tribunal did not implead the other three persons and the legal representatives of the fourth co-tenant and he instituted the appeal only against the landlords. The Tribunal, relying on a judgment in the case of Choudhry Singh v. Manohar Lal, A. I. R. 1977 SC 240 and in the case of Invest Imports v. Watkin Mayour Co. (the citation of the case is not mentioned) held that the appeal filed by the appellant was incompetent and there was no ground to allow the application for bringing on record those persons and for condonation of delay. The said applications were also dismissed. The case decided by their Lordships of the Supreme Court referred to above is clearly distinguishable on facts from the present case inasmuch as in that case one of the decree-holders was not impleaded as a respondent and in that situation, it was held that there will be conflicting decrees in case the appeal is allowed to be proceeded with without impleading one of the decree-holders. The prov