The court clarified that Section 10 of the CPC applies only to suits and not to applications in pending suits. Additionally, the Rent Controller does not have jurisdiction to adjudicate ownership/title disputes under the Haryana Urban (Control of Rent and Eviction) Act, 1973.

JUDGMENT :

Namit Kumar, J.

1. Instant revision petition has been filed by the petitioners under Article 227 of the Constitution of India challenging the order dated 17.05.2023 passed by Rent Controller, Kalka, whereby application filed by them for stay of further proceedings till the decision of title of the property between the same parties, has been dismissed.

2. Brief facts leading to the present revision petition are that property No.736/1, Ahata Murari Lal, Kalka consisting of first floor and second floor was rented out in favour of petitioner No.2 Dr. Dinesh Kumar Sharma, by the original owner Sh. Sadhu Ram Mittal, wayback in the year 1983. After the death of Sh. Sadhu Ram Mittal, his legal heirs sold the property in question to the respondent herein vide registered sale deed dated 25.07.2019. In July 2021, petitioner No.2 filed a suit for pre-emption against respondent as regards sale deed dated 25.07.2019, claiming himself to be owner in occupation of the suit property. Simultaneously, during the same period, respondent filed an eviction petition against the petitioners. In the eviction petition, petitioners moved an application for staying the further proceedings till the decision of civil suit for pre-emption filed at their instance. The Rent Controller vide impugned order dated 17.05.2023 dismissed the application filed by the petitioners. The said order has been challenged in this revision petition.

3. Learned counsel for the petitioners contended that once the ownership of the property was being claimed at their instance in the suit for pre-emption, pending the said suit, the learned Rent Controller should have allowed the application and stayed the proceedings in the rent petition till the decision of the suit. Learned counsel submitted that as the issue involved in both the proceedings was directly and substantially the same, the learned Rent Controller was under an obligation to stay its hand till the final adjudication of the previously instituted suit between the same parties.

4. I have heard learned counsel for the petitioners and perused the record.

5. It is pertinent to mention here that earlier also petitioners moved similar application qua property in dispute under Section 10 read with Section 151 CPC for staying the further proceedings before the Rent Controller, which was dismissed by the Rent Controller vide order dated 02.08.2022. Against the said order of the Rent Controller, petitioners filed Revision Petition being CR-4254 of 2022, which was dismissed by a Coordinate Bench of this Court vide order dated 10.10.2022 by observing as under:-

“On a bare reading of Section 10 CPC, it can be traced out that the same can only be invoked in case, the two separate proceedings in which the matter in issue is said to be directly and substantially be same, must arise out of two separate civil suits. The language used by the legislature, under Section 10 CPC which is relevant for the purpose of present adjudication are reproduced hereunder:-

“Section 10. Stay of suit:-No court shall proceed with the trial of any suit in which the matter in issue is also directly and substantially in issue in a previously instituted suit between the same parties or between parties under whom they or any of them claim litigating under the same title where such suit is pending in the same or any other Court in India have jurisdiction to grant the relief claimed, or in any Court beyond the limits of India established or continued by the Central Government and having like jurisdiction, or before the Supreme Court.”

Even the heading of the provision makes it more than apparent that the said provision is applicable to suits only and an application can be filed in a pending suit for staying the proceedings in case the matter in issue involved therein is directly and substantially an issue in a previously instituted suit between the same parties.

In the present case, the petitioners have moved an application under Section 10 CPC, in an eviction p