1951 Present: Gratiaen J.

RANASINGHE, Appellant, and FERNANDO, Respondent

S. C. 172-C. R. Colombo, 29,691

Rent Restriction Act, No. 29 of 1948-Section 5 (2) (c)-Construction--Arrears of rent-Computation.

No order of a Rent Control Board or of a Board of Review constituted under the provisions of the Rent Restriction Act, No. 29 of 1948, fixing the rental for any premises at a sum different from the rental previously fixed by agreement between the parties can operate retrospectively.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Court of Requests, Colombo.

H. W. Tambiah, for the defendant appellant.

C. E. Jayewardene, for the plaintiff respondent.

Cur. adv. vult.

November 21, 1951. GRATIAEN J.-

This appeal relates to an action against a tenant for the recovery of alleged arrears of rent and also for ejectment from certain premises to which the provisions of the Rent Restriction Act, No. 29 of 1948, are admittedly applicable.

The plaintiff let a portion of a building in Hulftsdorp to the defendant with effect from April 1, 1945, at an agreed monthly rental of Rs. 25. It is not suggested that this sum exceeds the authorised rent for the premises within the meaning of the Act.

On some date in 1948 the plaintiff desired to increase the rental to an amount which would not offend the provisions of the Act. The defendant retaliated by claiming a reduction. The dispute was accordingly referred to the decision of a Rent Control Board constituted under the Act and vested with jurisdiction under Section 5 (2) (c) to vary (subject to confirmation, variation or annulment by the Board of Review) the rent fixed by agreement between the parties.

Parliament has in its wisdom decided that disputes of this kind between landlords and tenants are of such urgency that they can be settled more expeditiously and conveniently by extra-judicial tribunals established for the purpose. It is therefore legitimate to express the hope that the history of the present dispute before these tribunals is not characteristic of the experience of persons who resort to the machinery set up by the Rent Restriction Act.

On October 21, 1948, the Colombo Rent Control Board investigated the dispute and made order reducing the rent to Rs. 15 per mensem. The plaintiff appealed to the Board of Review which on January 15, 1949, allowed the appeal and remitted the matter for a fresh inquiry, in conformity with certain specified directions, by the tribunal of first instance. This second inquiry took place on July 7, 1950, when the Rent Control Board purported to make order fixing the monthly rental at Rs. 20. The plaintiff again appealed. On September 30, 1950, the Board of Review once more set aside the order under appeal and ordered yet another inquiry de novo by the Rent Control Board. In the result, although two years had now elapsed, the settlement of the dispute, in the manner contemplated by the Act, had made no progress, and there; was no binding order fixing the rental payable by the defendant to the plaintiff at a sum different to that fixed by the parties in terms of their original agreement.

The plaintiff instituted the present action on September 22, 1950, and the rights of the parties must be considered with reference to the position as it stood at that date. The main cause of action on which the plaintiff relied in claiming a decree for ejectment was that the defendant was in arrears of rent within the meaning of proviso (a) to Section 13 (1) of the Act.

The facts relating to this issue are not in dispute. After the first abortive order was made by the Rent Control Board on October 1948, the defendant repudiated liability to pay the previously agreed monthly rental of Rs. 25. He tendered instead Rs. 15 each month on the assumption that this sum now represented the rent fixed by the Board within the meaning of Section 5 (2) (c) of the Act. Payment on this basis was rejected by the plaintiff.