The court emphasizes that amendments to eviction defenses based on earlier admissions cannot be granted after significant delays, maintaining procedural integrity in tenancy disputes.

HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE MANOJ JAIN J U D G M E N T (oral

1. Petitioner is defending an eviction petition filed on the ground of bonafide requirement.

2. It was filed in the year 2013.

3. An application seeking leave to defend was moved on 18.12.2013, but, unfortunately, arguments on said application have yet not been heard.

4. After more than a decade, an application was moved seeking amendment in such leave to defend application and the grievance is with respect to dismissal of such application.

5. When the application seeking leave to defend was moved, tenant, therein mentioned he was earlier a tenant in the demised premises and that he had surrendered his tenancy rights in February 2006, and, thereafter, one Mr.

Rajiv Soni, was taken as tenant in the demised premises w.e.f. 01.03.2006.

6. In the application seeking amendment, it has been claimed that previous counsel had taken a fictitious plea regarding surrendering of tenancy and such plea was taken without any instructions and without any knowledge and consent of the tenant. It is submitted by the tenant that his then counsel Signature Not Verified CM(M) 1687/2025 1 Digitally Signed had assured that there was no need of his appearing before the Court and he had taken his signatures on certain papers. All in all, according to tenant, he had never taken any such plea that he had ever surrendered his tenancy rights and that one Mr. Rajiv Soni, thereafter, became a tenant in the demised premises.

7. It is, however, quite baffling and surprising as to how an application to the aforesaid effect was filed after more than ten years.

8. When asked as to what was the educational qualification of the tenant, no definite reply could come from his counsel.

9. This Court is conscious about the procedure prescribed for any such petition which seeks eviction on the ground of bonafide requirement. In such type of matters, timeframe has been given for the purposes of filing any application seeking leave to defend and the summary procedure and the objective behind incorporation of Section 25 (B) of Delhi Rent Control Act , 2015 cannot be sidelined and disregarded in the manner it is being attempted to be done in the case in hand.

10. The entire thrust of the tenant is to pass on the buck to his previous counsel by contending that the aforesaid stand regarding surrendering of tenancy was without any instructions. It is also contended that same counsel was representing the alleged sub-tenant as well which smacks of malafide on his part. It is also argued that a complaint against the previous counsel has already been lodged with the Bar Council of Delhi and, therefore, it was a fit case where such amendment should have been allowed by the learned Controller.

11. By moving amendment application, the sole endeavour of the tenant is to retract from what has been mentioned in his application seeking leave to Signature Not Verified CM(M) 1687/2025 2 Digitally Signed defend. He wants to wriggle out of his admission and wants to project that he had, all along, been tenant in the premises in question.

12. The impugned order dated 29.11.2024 clearly records that attempt of the tenant is to revert from his admission. It also mentions that if such application is allowed, it would cause irreparable loss and injustice to the petitioner, particularly, when the aforesaid stand was maintained by the tenant for more than ten years.

13. In such type of summary procedure, there is very limited scope of permitting any amendment. It is, at best, restricted to a subsequent event which was not within the knowledge of any such defendant/tenant when the application seeking leave to defend was filed at earlier point of time.

14. In Prithipal Singh v. Satpal Singh (2010) 2 SCC 15 , it was held that the statutory priod of 15 days for filing leave to defend application was inflexible, and that whatever is to be stated in