The central legal point established in the judgment is the significance of proper service of summons in eviction proceedings and the consequences of invalid service on the eviction order.

Mukta Gupta, J.

1. An eviction petition was filed by Smt. Santosh Jain, the Petitioner under Section 14(1) (e) read with Section 25-B of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (in short ‘the DRC Act’) on 28th September, 2010 for eviction of the tenanted premises in occupation of the Respondents Praveen Kumar Gupta and Manbhav Gupta on the ground that the tenanted premises was required bona fidely for her son who after having established as a lawyer requires the same to set up his law office.

2. In the Eviction Petition No. 139/2010 the learned ARC issued notice on 28th September, 2010. Respondent No. 1, Praveen Kumar Gupta was served by the Process Server through his employee on 13th October, 2010. Respondent No. 1 was also served through the Registered Post but the date was not legible. Since no leave to defend was filed within 15 days of the service of the process on 13th October, 2010 vide order dated 23rd December, 2010, the eviction petition of Santosh Jain was allowed and an eviction order was passed against Praveen Kumar Gupta and Manbhav Gupta directing them to vacate Shop Nos. 4750-51, Plot No. 8, Deputy Ganj, Sadar Bazar, Delhi-110006, that is, the tenanted premises.

3. A review petition was filed by Praveen Kumar and Manbhav contending that the service of summons to the Respondents through Registered AD Post was never tendered to the Respondents at the tenanted premises. Sanjay Gupta, on whom summons were served, through ordinary process, was never their employee. Manbhav was not carrying on any business from the tenanted premises at the time when the service was effected but was working as Management Trainee with Phoenix and was not present in the tenanted premises on 13th October, 2010. Sanjay Gupta was not an employee of Praveen Kumar. Since no process came to be served on Praveen and Manbhav on 13th October, 2010 the order is required to be reviewed.

4. In the review petition it was further stated that on 28th May, 2011 Sudhir Kumar Jain, a shopkeeper of the locality, known to the husband of Smt. Santosh Jain informed Praveen Kumar that during talks between him and husband of Smt. Santosh Jain, he was informed that the premises was got vacated from three tenants and he is going to get the premises vacated from Praveen Kumar shortly. On hearing this Praveen Kumar got suspicious and thus found out the facts when it was revealed about the eviction petition being instituted and having been decided on 23rd December, 2010 in Room No. 286. The file of eviction petition was inspected on 31st May, 2011 and thus the review petition was filed as the order was obtained on false allegations and concealment of facts.

5. After completion of pleadings, evidence was led by both the parties and vide impugned order dated 15th December, 2014 the learned ARC reviewed its order dated 23rd December, 2010 directing eviction of Praveen Kumar and Manbhav from the tenanted premises. The learned ARC held that even the ordinary summons were served on Sanjay Gupta who claimed to be an employee of Praveen Kumar and Manbhav and thus the same was not a proper service. Further the said Sanjay Gupta on whom ordinary summons had been served has not been proved to be an employee of Praveen Kumar and Manbhav and at best he was the cousin brother of Praveen and paternal uncle of Manbhav. In these circumstances Sanjay Gupta cannot be said to be the recognized agent of Praveen and Manbhav and thus there was no proper service on them.

6. Before this Court learned counsel for the Petitioner Smt. Santosh Jain refers to the statement of the postman and PW-3 Narender Kumar, the Process Server. Narender Kumar stated that the summons were received by one person whose signatures were at point ‘C’ and he prepared the report. However, he further stated that he cannot recognize the person who had signed the summons at point ‘C’ on Ex.PW-3/1 and ‘D’ on Ex. PW-3/2 since long time has elapsed. However, when Sanjay Gupta entered the Court room, PW-3 Narender Kumar id