ORDER :

Prayer: Petition filed under Article 227 of The Constitution of India against the order dated 20.10.2022 passed in M.P. No. 2 of 2022 in RLTOP No. 139 of 2021 by the learned Judge, XIV Small Causes Court, Chennai.

1. The Civil Revision Petition has been instituted under Article 227 of the Constitution of India challenging the order dated 20.10.2022 passed in M.P. No. 2 of 2022 in RLTOP No. 139 of 2021. The revision petitioner is the land lord, who instituted the petition in RLTOP No. 139 of 2021 to evict the respondent/tenant from the said premises on the ground that the revision petitioner has not entered into an agreement with the respondent/tenant. The petition was filed under Section 21(2)(a) of the TN Act 42 of 2017.

2. The grievance of the revision petitioner is that during the pendency of rent control proceedings, the respondent/tenant has not paid the admitted monthly rent of Rs. 70,000/-.

3. The learned counsel for the petitioner contended that the petitioner is a divorced woman and depending on the rental income for leading her livelihood. Since the respondent/tenant has not paid the rent for the past about fourteen months from the month of December 2021 to till date, she has not been able to lead her livelihood and, therefore, filed the miscellaneous petition in M.P. No. 2 of 2022 for a direction to pay the monthly rent punctually to the revision petitioner. The Rent Court adjudicated the issues and made the finding that the miscellaneous petition for claiming arrears of rent under Section 25 of the RLTOP Act is not maintainable since the eviction petition was filed under Section 21(2)(a) of the Act. The learned counsel for the petitioner reiterated that the land lord is entitled for monthly rent which is admitted by the respondent/tenant. Thus, the trial Court committed an error in rejecting the application.

4. The learned counsel for the respondent/Tenant objected the said contentions by stating that Section 25 of the new Act prohibits entertaining any miscellaneous application if the eviction petition is filed under Section 21(2)(a) and 21(2)(b) of the Act. The learned counsel for the respondent/tenant further states that the RLTOP itself is not maintainable and in this regard he had referred to certain judgments of this Court.

5. The learned counsel for the revision petitioner states that the Miscellaneous Petition filed for recovery of rent is maintainable even during the pendency of the application for eviction filed under Section 21(2)(a) of the Act.

6. Section 25 of the New Act denotes payment of rent during eviction proceedings as under:

“In any proceedings for recovery of possession on any ground other than that referred to in clause (a) or clause (b) of sub-section (2) of Section 21, the tenant contests the claim for eviction, the landlord may, at any stage of proceedings, apply to the Rent Court to direct the tenant to pay to the landlord rent payable as under Section 8 and the Rent Court may order the tenant to make such payment as agreed regularly to the landlord by the tenth of the month and all other charges due from the tenant along with penal charges, if any, due to delay in the same manner as provided in sub-section (1) of Section 13.”

7. The above provision is unambiguous that if any application for eviction is filed on the ground under Section 21(2)(a) or 21(2)(b) of the Act, then the Miscellaneous Application for payment of rent during the eviction proceedings are not entertainable. Thus, the Rent Court is right in dismissing the Miscellaneous Petition filed by the revision petitioner for payment of rent by the respondent/tenant. However, this Court is of an opinion that in such circumstances, the application filed by the landlord for eviction under Section 21(2)(a) or 21(2)(b) of the Act is to be disposed of within the time limit as contemplated under Section 36(6) of the New Act.

8. On the one hand, the Rent Court cannot keep the proceedings beyond the time limit prescribed under the new Act an