Maintainability of the petition for eviction filed by landlord an owner of a residential building.

K.M. Natarajan, J.

1. On a reference made by the learned Chief Justice, the matter came up before this Full Bench to resolve the apparent conflict between the judgments of the Division Benches of this Court in V. Danmull Sowcar v. Syed Ali Mohamed (1969) 1 M.L.J. 184 and V.R. Jayaram v. N.S. Ramalingam 1975 T.L.N.J. 393. The questions that requires an answer by us in this reference is whether the landlord is entitled to maintain an application for eviction under Section 10(3)(a)(iii) of the Tamil Nadu Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act (hereinafter referred to as the Act) on the ground of requirement of the premises for accommodating the partners business where one of the members of the family is a partner C.R.P. No. 2791 of 1983 arises out of a petition in H.R.C.O.P. No. 352 of 1981 wherein it is stated that the non-residential premises bearing new Door No. 10, Rattan Bazaar Road (and new Door No. 10, Ashtabujam Lane) described as item 1 and 2 in the schedule, were let out to the first respondent. The petitioner is carrying on business in partnership under the name and style of 'Mahnoor' at Door No. 208, Purasawakkam High Road which is a rented building. Since the petitioner is not occupying any building of his own for the purpose of business which he is carrying on in partnership, he has filled the petition for eviction on the ground that the said building is required for accommodating the partnership business. The question arose in that case is whether the petitioner who is not doing exclusive business but is only one of the partners in the partnership can ask for possession for accommodating the partnership business in the petition mentioned premises. The facts which are necessary for framing a similar question involved in C.R.P. No. 4276 of 1984 are that the petitioner-landlord filed the petition for eviction on the ground that he requires the premises bearing Door (new Door No. 1) Rama Pillai Street, Periamet, on the ground that he and five others are carrying on business in hides and skin in partnership under the name and style of Messrs Sadiq and Company at new Door No. 12, Kumarappa Chetty Street Periamet which is a rented premises, that the petitioners other partners do not own any other building of their own and that the petitioner bona fide requires the premises for the purpose of carrying on business in partnership. There also a similar question arose as in C.R.P. No. 2791 of 1983.

3. Before ever adverting to the decision on this point quoted by the learned counsel appearing on both side it is worthwhile to extract the provisions of the Act. Section 10(3)(a)(iii) reads as follows :

A landlord may, subject to the provisions of Clause (d), apply to the Controller for an order directing the tenant to put the landlord in possession of the building -

(i) ...

(ii) ...

(iii) in case it is any other non-residential building, if the landlord or any member of his family is not occupying for purposes of business which he or any member of his family is carrying on, a non-residential building, in the city, town or village concerned which is his own.

In the said section, the words "any member of his family" are substituted in the place of "his son" by virtue of Section 10 of Act 23 of 1973.

4. The earliest decision of the Division Bench of this Court on this point is one reported in Danmull v. Syed Ali . The

question referred to the Division Bench in the above quoted case was whether one of the partners of a firm who is the owner of a non-residential premises could apply for eviction of the tenant occupying the same on the ground that he required it for carrying on his partnership business, under Section 10(3)(a)(iii) of the Act 18 of 1960. The Division Bench after considering the various earlier decisions of this court and other High Courts and the All India English Reports, held :

Under Section 10(3)(a)(iii) of the Madras Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act (Act XVIII of 1960), the application is maintainable and that it