Vipin Sanghi, J.

1. The present regular second appeal under Section 100 is directed against the judgment and decree dated 20.03.2012 passed by the learned Additional District Judge (Central) 12, Tis Hazari Courts, Delhi in RCA No. 15/2006 preferred by the appellant/plaintiff. By the impugned judgment, the said first appeal under Section 96 of the CPC has been dismissed, and the judgment and decree dated 01.03.2006 passed by the learned Civil Judge, Delhi in Suit No. 203/1998 of the appellant/plaintiff – dismissing the suit for recovery of possession, has been upheld.

2. The appellant/plaintiff, who is the owner of the suit property, had filed the said suit for possession against Smt. Ram Piari Chawla on 24.09.1983. During the pendency of the suit, the defendant passed away. Consequently, the suit was continued against the legal representatives. The said suit was premised on the plea that Smt. Ram Piari Chawla had inherited limited tenancy rights in respect of the suit property upon the demise of her late husband late Dr. Gopal Singh Chawla-the original tenant, by virtue of Section 2(l)(iii) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (‘the Act’) and her limited tenancy right having come to an end, the plaintiff was entitled to evict the defendant. The material findings returned by the learned Civil Judge while dismissing the suit were that the contractual tenancy of the original tenant Dr. Gopal Singh Chawla had been validly terminated during his lifetime vide legal notice dated 19.10.1978; that the finding returned by the learned Rent Controller (RC) in his order dated 04.05.1968 passed in an earlier eviction petition filed by the landlord – with regard to the purpose of letting of the suit premises, operated as res judicata under Section 11 of the CPC; that the finding of the learned RC in the order dated 04.05.1968 (passed in the eviction petition filed by the landlord), was that the purpose of letting of the suit premises was residential-cum-commercial; that Section 2(l)(iii) of the Act was not applicable in the facts of the present case as the said provision applies only to residential premises in view of the judgment of the Supreme Court in Kamla Devi Vs. Satya P. Goel, 1987 (33) DLT 151, that on the death of Dr. G.S. Chawla, all his legal heirs inherited the tenancy as per the ordinary law of succession; that the tenancy rights could not be deemed to have been extinguished upon the expiry of period of one year from the date of death of late Sh. G.S. Chawla and his tenancy rights devolved on all legal heirs as per law of succession as held in Gian Devi Anand Vs. Jeevan Kumar, (1985) 2 SCC 63.

3. The First Appellate Court while passing the impugned judgment reversed the finding of the Trial Court – that the finding with regard to the purpose of letting returned by the RC in the order dated 04.05.1968 was res judicata. While doing so, the learned Additional District Judge took into account the fact that in appeal against the order dated 04.05.1968 passed by the RC, the learned Rent Control Tribunal (RCT) held that the eviction petition was not maintainable on account of lack of adequate notice of the termination of tenancy prior to filing of the eviction petition, and that the learned RCT “rejected” the eviction petition. The learned Additional District Judge held that the learned RCT was conscious of the fact that invalidity of the notice went to the root of the matter and the eviction petition merited “rejection” without dwelling into the merits of the case. For want of notice, the eviction petition had no substratum. In this regard, the learned Additional District Judge relied upon Jeevan Kumar Khanna Vs. Ajudhia Pershad Murgai & Ors., 34 (1988) Delhi Law Times 355; Ram Kishan Vs. Bharat Bhushan, 1979 Rajdhani Law Reporter 194; and Jeevraj Munshi Shah Vs. Collector Thane, 1995 AIHC 2642 (in which reliance has been