The jurisdiction of the Civil Courts is impliedly barred from the field covered by the provisions of the Haryana Urban (Control of Rent and Eviction) Act, 1973.

S.S.SANDHAWALIA, J.

1. .Whether the jurisdiction of the Civil Courts is impliedly barred from the field covered from specifically and squarely by the provisions of the Haryana Urban (Control of Rent and Eviction) Act, 1973, is the significant and the pristinely legal question which is before this Full Bench on a reference.

2. The relevant facts would pale into relative insignificance in view of the primarily legal nature of, the issue aforesaid. Nevertheless, the matrix of facts giving rise to controversy has inevitably to be noticed in the first instance. Gobind Ram respondent-landlord had on May 31, 1975 preferred a suit for possession of a shop claiming that the construction thereof had been completed in the month of August, 1969. During the pendency of the suit, the Haryana Urban (Control of Rent and Eviction) Act, 1973 (hereinafter called the Act) was amended with the result that all the non-residential buildings constructed after March 1962, would also come within the ambit of the Act . As a necessary consequence the ground on which the ejectment of the tenant was sought from the shop in dispute disappeared and the petitioner tenant preferred an application that the suit may be dismissed at least qua the relief of ejectment. The trial court, however, rejected the application holding apparently that despite the virtual barring of the relief of ejectment by a decree of the Civil Court, the suit was nevertheless maintainable. The petitioner-tenant has come up by way of this Revision Petition.

3. The matter came up before my learned brother S.P. Goyal, J. Noticing the thin and perhaps an unsustainable line of distinction between Section 13(1) of the Act and the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949 which had been drawn in Suresh Kumar V/s. Bhim Sain (1978) 80 Punj LR 751, and further two Division Bench judgements of the Court holding that Section 13(1) of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949 did not affect the jurisdiction of the Civil Court to pass the decree for ejectment, he referred the matter to a larger Bench to examine the correctness of the view expressed.

4. As the legal position both under the Punjab and the Haryana rent statutes would hereinafter inevitably come for consideration, it becomes necessary to notice the history of this rent legislation in order to place the matter in a correct perspective. The parent statute was enacted nearly four decades ago, when in pre-partition India, in the wake of the 2nd World War and the imposition of taxes on buildings and land within the limits of Lahore Municipality and the other urban areas of the State, it became necessary to promulgate the Punjab (Urban) Rent Restriction Act. 1941 (Act X of 1941). The primary object thereof was to restrict the increase of rents of certain premises, but the decision of all the questions arising thereunder was still left to the ordinary Civil Courts. However, when six years later the Punjab Rent Restriction Act, 1947, was promulgated on April 14, 1947, more meaningful changes were introduced in the law and the earlier statute was substantially recast. The concept of a Controller to be appointed by the provincial Government, to perform the functions under the Act, was introduced and the material issues arising for determination under the Act were designedly excluded from the ordinary run of Civil Courts and vested in the Controller so appointed. This Act applied to all urban areas in the undivided Punjab, including the territories (now in Haryana) and set up a new machinery for determining the fair rent and performing the other function under the Act by the Controller and appeals thereform were prescribed to lie before an Appellate Authority. This procedure was given finality and Section 15(4) of 1947 Act provided that these decisions would not be liable to be called in question in any court of law, whether in a suit or other proceeding by way of appeal or revision. These provisions of the aforesaid Act continued