The court emphasized that the plea about the property being a Waqf property and the ARC's jurisdiction had no merit, as similar pleas had been rejected in a previous judgment.

JAYANT NATH, J.

1. This revision petition is filed under section 25B(8) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (hereinafter referred to as the ‘DRC Act’) seeking to impugn the eviction order dated 22.08.2016 passed by the Additional Rent Controller (hereinafter referred to as ‘the ARC’).

2. Respondent/landlord had filed an eviction petition against the petitioner/tenant for property being one shop measuring 15’ x 9’ being No. 1641A, Shyama Prasad, Mukherjee Marg, Delhi-110006. The respondents are joint owners of the property in question and also of adjacent properties. Respondent No.2 is a hotelier and is running a hotel under the name and style of M/s.New Royal Hotel from the first and upward floors of the property in question. The Eviction Petition has been filed for the bona fide need of respondent No.1 who has decided to open a plush restaurant for which he has got a project report prepared. It is urged that there are about 50 hotels in the vicinity of the tenanted property but there is no posh restaurant in the area. The respondent is said to require an area of approximately 5000 sq.ft. to open his restaurant and hence requires the entire ground floor portion to complete his project. Respondent No.1 is said to have sufficient knowledge and experience of working at the family hotel business since he has returned from Australia.

3. Pursuant to the present Eviction Petition the respondents filed their application for leave to defend. The said application was dismissed by the ARC as the petitioners failed to raise triable issues. An eviction order was passed in favour of the respondents and against the petitioners.

4. The facts and issues raised in the present petition are identical to the facts and issues raised in RC.REV. 116/2016 titled as M/s Seth & Sons Private Limited vs. Arjun Uppal & Anr. The said RC.REV. 116/2016 pertains to a property bearing no. 1647, Shyama Prasad, Mukherjee Marg, Delhi-110006, which is near to the property in question in the present petition. Both the petitions have common respondents inasmuch as the landlord are the same and the stated requirement of the property is the same i.e. need of respondent No.1 to open a plush restaurant.. The contentions raised by the petitioner to oppose the eviction order are also virtually identical to the contentions raised by the petitioner in the above noted Revision Petition. This fact of similarity of the facts and issues with RC.REV. 116/2016 was admitted by learned counsel for the petitioner when this matter was heard.

5. However, for the first time before this Court now the petitioner has sought to raise an additional ground to impugn the eviction order claiming that the ARC had no powers to deal with the Waqf property. It was pleaded that after the eviction order dated 22.8.2016, on 29.8.2016 the Delhi Waqf Board confirmed on an RTI that the suit premises is Waqf property and continues to be so. Accordingly, it is pleaded that the petitioner tendered rent to the Delhi Waqf Board qua the suit premises. Based on this, it is pleaded that the ARC had no jurisdiction to pass any eviction order.

6. I may note that the petitioner not having raised this plea before the ARC cannot possibly now in the present Revision Petition start raising additional grounds which he ought to have known considering that he is an old tenant.

7. I may, however, note that this new plea raised by the petitioner is without any basis. The respondents have also placed on record documents to show that the Waqf Board in response to RTI query on 19.10.2016 has clarified that the suit property i.e. 1641A, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Marg, Delhi is not of Waqf Board. The respondent has also filed a copy of the communication dated 30.12.2016 written to the proprietor by the partner of the petitioner Shri Jaswinder Singh Chugh returning the cheques for rent deposited by the petitioner as the property does not belong to Delhi Waqf Board.

8. It is quite clear that there is no merit in the plea of the pe