The requirement under Section 106 for notice termination to coincide with the tenancy month is not mandatory for justice, equity, or good conscience.

1. This is a tenant's second appeal arising out of a suit for ejectment.

2. The plaintiff filed a suit alleging that the premises mentioned in the plaint were let out to the defendant on a monthly rent of Rs. 18.00 per mensem in the year 1973. On April 16, 1973, the landlord served a notice on the tenant requiring him to vacate the premises. Because of his refusal to leave, the plaintiff filed the suit. The suit was resisted by the defendant on the ground, inter alia, that the notice terminating his tenancy was invalid. The trial court decreed the suit, and an appeal by the defendant has been dismissed by the learned District Judge. And now this second appeal.

3. Learned counsel for the appellant contends that the notice terminating the tenancy is invalid because the provisions of S. 106 of the Transfer of Property Act require that the notice period should terminate with the month of the tenancy, and in this case, it is said, the tenancy month closed on the 8th May 1973 while the notice allowed the appellant time upto 9th May, 1973. In my judgment, the appeal must be dismissed, but while doing so I must record that learned counsel for the appellant very fairly placed all the cases on the point before me.

4. The area out of which the present case arises was formerly a tehsil in the erstwhile State of Punjab. It was incorporated in Himachal Pradesh by virtue of the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966. Under S. 88 of that Act, the laws in force in that area before its incorporation in Himachal Pradesh continue in force even thereafter. Accordingly, this case must be disposed of under the law prevailing in Punjab. Now, there can be no dispute that the Transfer of Property Act has not been applied as such to the territory of the erstwhile State of Punjab, and the courts have confined themselves to applying the principles embodied therein insofar as they can be said to be founded in justice, equity and good conscience. Nemdeo Lokman Lodhi v. Narmadabai AIR 1953 SC 228 , the Supreme Court declared that all the provisions of S.105 to 116 of the T. P. Act could not be regarded as founded in reason and equity. It is only to the extent that those sections of the Act give statutory recognition to the principles of justice, enquity and good conscience that they are applicable also to cases not governed by the Act. The law declared by the Supreme Court has been followed by the Delhi High Court in Messrs. C. L. Mehra and Sons v. Kharak Singh 1968 Pun LR (D) 55. A number of cases on the point were considered by the Punjab High Court in Sahib Dayal v. Joti Parshad 1968 Delhi LT 182 and it was laid down by the learned Judges that the rule embodied in S. 106 of the T. P. Act that notice terminating the tenancy should expire with the end of the month of the tenancy is a rule of a technical nature and cannot be regarded as proceeding out of justice, equity and good conscience. Thereafter, the point was considered by the Punjab and Haryana High Court in Sewaraj Pal v. Janak Raj AIR 1969 Punj and Har 26 and it was specifically laid down that although the requirement of service of notice terminating the tenancy was founded in justice, equity good conscience, the provision in that section requiring the notice to expire with the end of the month of the tenancy could not be regarded in that light. It may be mentioned that the earlier view of the Lahore High Court in Rattan Sen Sachhar v. Sm. Krishan Kaur AIR 1933 Lah 134, which appears to have applied the rule in S. 106 in its entire rigour was not approved of in the later cases.

5. In my Judgment, the opinion expressed in these later cases is, with respect, one which commends itself. There can be no doubt that insofar as S. 106 of the Transfer of Property Act