Rameshchandra Sharma vs Madhavrao - 1986 Supreme(MP) 685

Judicial Analysis Court Copy Headnote Facts Arguments Court observation

Advocates Appeared:
For the Appellant : S. C. Bagadia.
For the Respondent: D. Kshirsagar.

Headnote:Accommodation Control Act, 1961 (M. P.) – S. 23 – J and 23 – A – accommodation acquired after retirement – Government servant not 'landlord' as defined in S. 23 – J – application not maintainable under S. 23 – A.
        Short Note
       1. The respondent owned a house at 216, Usha Nagar, Indore. The petitioner is a tenant in four rooms of that house. The respondent after serving a notice to the petitioner had submitted an application for eviction before the Rent Controlling Authority under section 23 – A of the amended provisions of the Madhya Pradesh Accommodation Control Act. The petitioner appeared before the Authority after service of summons on him and was granted leave as is required under section 23 – C (1) of tile M. P. Accommodation Control Act. During the pendency of the eviction petition before the Rent Controlling Authority, the M. P. Accommodation Control Act was amended by the M. P. Accommodation Control (Amendment) Act, 1985 (No.7 of 1985). The Act was published in the Madhya Pradesh Gazette (Extraordinary) dated 27 – 4 – 1985. By section 7 of the Amendment Act, 1985 new section, namely, section 23 – J was inserted in Chapter III A after section 23 of the principal Act. By section 23 – J the definition of the landlord for the purpose of Chapter III – A was changed and the applications of the provision relating to new forum was restricted only to the specified category of landlords i.e. retired Government servants including members of the defence services, widows or divorced wives, physically handicapped person, etc. In section 9 of the Amendment Act of 1985, a provision was made to transfer all the applications filed under section 23 – A before the Rent Controlling Authority by the landlord other than that defined in section 23 – J to evict the tenant exclusive on the ground of bona fide requirement of accommodation to a civil Court of competent jurisdiction.
       2. In the instant case, the statement of the applicant has been recorded by the Court on 2 – 5 – 1985. On 13 – 5 – 1985, the certificate of the applicant being the retired Government servant was ordered to be produced. On 13 – 6 – 1985 the Army Discharge Certificate was produced and on 22 – 6 – 1985 the final order was passed. Now the legal position is that on 27 – 4 – 1985 all the applications for ejectment filed under section 23 – A of the M. P. Accommodation Control Act stood transferred to the civil Court of competent jurisdiction except those cases in which the landlords fell within the definition of section 23 – J inserted by the Amendment Act of 1985. Therefore, after 27 – 4 – 1985, the Court was under an obligation to ascertain first whether the landlord falls within the definition of section 23 – J and the property which is the subject – matter of suit is a property which bas an nexus with the definition of the landlord under section 23 – J of the Act.
       3. Held : In the instant case, the non applicant was discharged from the Military on 1 – 8 – 1916. According to the application u/s 23 – A filed by the landlord, the suit accommodation was constructed in the year 1964, that is, much after the retirement of the landlord, this property was acquired and then was given on rent to the present applicant and others. The M. P. Accommodation Control Act was amended to provide a special forum for expeditious disposal of eviction proceedings filed by the landlord on the ground of bona fide need and when this special forum was created, landlords of all categories were entitled to invoke the jurisdiction of that special forum on the ground of bonafide need only. But by the M. P. Accommodation Control (Amendment) Act, 1985 (No.7 of 1985) the application of the provisions relating to new forum was restricted only to special categories of landlords, which included amongst others the retired Government servants. The intention of extending the benefit of the new forum to others and to the persons of the category specified in the Act is to treat them as a special class and lessen their hardship of a protracted litigation when they bona fide need the house for their own use and for the use of their family. The underlying idea of extending the facility to the retired Government servants appears to be that if during the service tenure they have a house which they have let out to some tenant, then after retirement if they need that house bonafidely for their own use or for the use of their family, then they may get the relief through this expeditious procedure and by applying to a newly constituted forum.
       4. A Division Bench of this Court in B. Johnson v. C. S. Naidu (1985 JLJ 793) had an occasion to consider whether a retired Government servant acquiring a house after his retirement and inducting a tenant thereafter may also claim to be within the ambit of clause (i) or (ii) of section 23 – J of the Act. Relying on the judgment of the Supreme Court in windifred Ross v. Fonseca (AIR 1984 SC 458) (para 14), the Division Bench has held that a landlord who is a retired Government savant acquired a house after retirement and inducted a tenant thereafter cannot claim to be within the ambit of clause (i) or clause (ii) of section 23 – J of the M. P. Accommodation Control Act. As such, in the instant case, the landlord – non – applicant does not fall within the definition of a retired Government servant as defined in clause (i) of section 23 – J of the Act. As such his application stood automatically transferred to the Civil Court of competent jurisdiction according to provisions of section 9 of the M. P. Accommodation Control (Amendment) Act, 1985. As such, the Rent Controlling Authority had no jurisdiction to continue the proceeding before it after 27 – 4 – 1985. The order impugned is, the therefore, clearly without jurisdiction. 1985 JLJ 793 and AIR 1984 SC 458 relied on.
       Revision allowed.