The court can grant relief based on facts ascertained during the trial, even if not pleaded in the plaint, as long as the defendant is not prejudiced.

Concurrent findings notwithstanding, the learned counsel for the appellant has raised a point of law which, he cautioned, was not technical and insisted that the suit was liable to be dismissed. Learned counsel on both sides have argued at length and rulings galore have been cited which undoubtedly shed not only light but also demonstrated how simple factual situations may present themselves with puzzling visages wearing legal masks. Even here, I may state that the best that could be done to transmute a technicality into a substantial point has been done by appellant's counsel and I shall proceed to consider what 1 regard are the essential questions which seek resolution in this case. At the outset I may also state that I have always adopted the view - and do so here - that law is essentially an instrument of justice although it may occasionally be at logger heads with it and the endeavour of the court should be to grant relief where it is due unless compelled by legal obstacles.

2. The plaintiff brought the present suit praying for a decree for delivery of possession of the shop-building scheduled to the plaint together with arrears of rent, Rs.519.86, calculated at the rate of Rs.50/- per month, together with interest at 6 per cent. The court-fee paid and the Allegations in the plaint leave no one in doubt that the suit was one by a lessor against his lessee. The tenancy relied on was a vadaka cheettu or rent bond dated 6-9-1967, marked Ext.A-1 in the suit. This deed is for a period of 7 months and reads like a lease although it is signed only by the defendant. It fixes a monthly rent of Rupees 50/-. The period having expired and a notice purporting to terminate the tenancy having been sent (vide Ext.A-2) the plaintiff claims that he is entitled to a decree for eviction with arrears of rent. The defendant in his written statement admits his possession and the execution of Ext.A-1, but pleads that the rate of rent has been wrongly shown as Rs.50/- with ulterior purposes, the current rent being only Rs.15/- and that notwithstanding Ext.A-1, the clause fixing the rate of rent at Rs.50/-has not been acted upon.

3. He has also pleaded discharge of rent. It is useful to extract a portion of the specific plea of the defendant relating to the lease. "The defendant begs to submit that the terms of the lease were that the defendant is liable to pay only Rs.15/- per month for a term of 7 months." The defendant has also contended that long prior to Ext.A-1 he had been in possession for more than 10 years and that Ext.A-1 showing a higher rent was brought into existence more to help the plaintiff to find a better buyer for the building since he had intended to sell it. Indeed, both the courts have concurrently held that the defendant was in occupation of the suit-building for well over 10 years before Ext.A-1. The defendant himself gave evidence to the effect that the rent before Ext.A-1 was Rs.15/-per month. The courts below, holding that Ext.A-1 was binding in all its terms on the defendant and negativing the plea of discharge of rent, decreed the suit as prayed for.

4. The only question mooted in court by counsel for the appellant is that Ext.A-1 is the foundation of the action but being unregistered cannot operate to create a lease when read in the light of Section 107 of the Transfer of Property Act and Section 49 of the Indian Registration Act. There being no valid lease in this view, the suit brought by the plaintiff as lessor on the strength of Ext.A-1 - and Ext.A-1 alone - must fail. It was argued that Section 107 insisted on registered leases in rases falling under paragraph 1. The term in Ext.A-1 being less than a year, we are concerned with paragraph 2 which prescribes that leases may be made "either by registered Instrument or by oral agreement accompanied by delivery of possession." There is no plea, says counsel, of any oral agreement coupled with delivery of possession and, therefore, a registered instrument becom