Maintainability of review petition against order of dismissal of revision.

This is an application for review of the order passed by me in C.R.P. No. 85 of 1952, dated 23rd January, 1952.

The short facts are: The petitioner Sri S.J.S. Fernandes is a tenant and the respondent Sri V. Ranganayakulu Chetty is the landlord in regard to premises No. 3, Singanna Naicken Street, G.T., Madras. The landlord filed a petition for eviction of the petitioner on the ground of sub-letting. The Rent Controller found the allegation proved and ordered eviction. The Appellate Court upheld the order. There was a revision petition to the High Court and after hearing the learned advocate for the petitioner, I dismissed the revision petition on the foot that there were no grounds to interfere in revision. This review application has been filed on grounds which have been made to fall under Order XLVII, rule 1, Civil Procedure Code.

The short point for determination is whether this application for review lies.

The Madras Buildings (Lease and Rent Control) Act, 1949, and the rules framed thereunder contain no provision for review and in fact it contained no provision for a revision before that and this Court was holding that no revision lay on account of the fact that the District and Subordinate Judges were appointed under the Act as persona designata and not as Courts. It is enough to cite the two decisions, viz., Abdul Wahid Sahib v. Abdul Khader Sahib1, decided by Yahya Ali, J., and similar decision by Mack, J., in Rajam Aiyar v. Pavanambal2. Yahya Ali J., held that from the language of section 12 it seemed clear that the District and Subordinate Judges mentioned by the notification functioned as persona designata and not as Courts subordinate to the High Court and as such an application for transfer of an appeal before such authority would not be maintainable. H.A. Aziz v. Kilyoboy3and Kiron Chandra v. Kalidas Chatterjee4, were referred to with approval. Therefore when the defects of the Act came to be considered on a suggestion made by the High Court itself, this specific provision for revision was made. But as pointed out just now the Act contains no provision for review.

Inasmuch as the Act contains no explicit provision for review the petitioner has supported his claim to one with reference to (a) the inherent powers of Court and (b) the Code of Civil Procedure.

So far as the invocation of the inherent powers of Court is concerned, it has been held repeatedly and has now become well-settled law that the power to review is not an inherent power of a judicial officer but such a right must be conferred by Statute. This is based upon the common-sense principle that prima facie a party who has obtained a decision is entitled to keep it unassailed unless the Legislature has indicated the mode by which it can be set aside. A review is practically the hearing of an appeal by the same officer who decided the case. Therefore, the course of decisions in this country has been to the effect that a right to review is not an inherent power: see David Nadar v. Manikka Vachaka Desika Gnana Pandara Sannadhi5, Lala Prayag Lal v. Jai Narayan Singh6, Baijnath Ram Goenka v. Nand Kumar Singh7and Anantharaju Shetty v. Appa Hegade8.

Therefore we have next to consider whether Order XLVII, rule 1, Civil Procedure Code, applies. It is now well-settled once again, that it is only when the Courts in this case the High Court which is appealed to or wherein revision is applied for, as one of the ordinary Courts of the country with regard to whose procedure, orders and decrees, in this particular matter the rules of the Code of Civil Procedure are applicable, then only it would attract Order XLVII, rule 1, of the Civil Procedure Code, because in such a case the ordinary incidents to litigation under the Civil Procedure Code, viz., review would be found available to the party and even that, so long as it is not excluded by specific provisions to the contrary. So we have got to see whether in the present proceedings where the High Court is reached tha