A statute operates in future and cannot be said to be retrospective merely because within the sweep of its operation all existing rights are included.

Judgement

GAJENDRAGADKAR, J. : This appeal by special leave arises out of a tenancy case instituted by the appellant against his tenants the respondents in the Court of the Mamaltdar, Raver (East Khandesh), in the State of Maharashtra. The property in suit consists of agricultural lands, Survey Nos. 32 and 38, situated in the village Raipur. The respondents had executed a rent note in respect of these lands in favour of the appellant on February 5, 1943. The period for which the rent note was executed was five years and the rent agreed to be paid annually was Rs. 785. In ordinary course the lease would have expired on March 31, 1948. However, before the lease expired on April 11, 1946 the Bombay Tenancy Act, 1939 (Bombay Act XXIX of 1939) was applied to the area of East Khandesh where the lands are situated, and in consequence as a result of Section 23 (1) (b) of the said Act the five years period stipulated in the rent note was statutorily extended to ten years; the result was that under the said statutory provision the rent note in favour of the respondents would have expired on March 31, 1953. During the subsistence of the tenancy thus statutorily extended the Bombay Tenancy and Agricultural Land Act LXVII of 1948 came into force. This Act repealed the earlier Act of 1939 except Sections 3, 3 (a) and 4 as modified. Sections 5 and 14 (2) of this Act are material. On March 11, 1952 the appellant gave notice to the respondents intimating to them that the period of the rent note executed by them which had been statutorily extended would expire on March 31, 1953 and calling upon them to deliver possession of the lands to him immediately thereafter. Before the notice could be effectively enforced on the expiration of the period of the lease, however, Bombay Act XXXIII of 1952 came into operation on January 12, 1953. This Act repealed S. 14 (2) and amended S. 5 and added sub-s. (3) to it. Shortly stated the effect of this amendment was that the tenancy of the respondents, who were till then ordinary tenants as distinct from protected tenants, could not be terminated on the expiry of their tenancy except by giving one year s notice and that too on the ground that the lands were required by the landlord for bona fide personal cultivation and that the income of the said lands would be the main source of income of the landlord. The relevant averments about these grounds had to be made by the landlord in issuing the notice to the tenants for terminating their tenancy.

2. On April 4, 1953 the appellant instituted the present tenancy proceedings for obtaining possession of the lands. The Mamlatdar who tried the proceedings rejected the appellant s claim on the ground that he had not terminated the tenancy of the respondents as required by law in that he had not given the statutory notice making the prescribed relevant averments in that behalf. The appellant then preferred an appeal against the decision of the Mamlatdar but the appellate authority agreed with the view taken by the Mamlatdar and dismissed his appeal. The dispute was then taken by the appellant before the Bombay Revenue Tribunal by way of a revisional application; and the revisional application succeeded. The Tribunal held that the relevant amendments on which the Mamlatdar and the appellate authority had relied in dismissing the appellant s claim were not retrospective and that the appellant was entitled to eject the respondents. This order of the Revenue Tribunal was challenged by the respondents by a petition filed by them under Art. 227 of the Constitution in the Bombay High Court. The High Court has allowed the writ petition and held that the relevant amendments are retrospective in operation and that the appellant is not entitled to eject the respondents. On that view the order passed by the Revenue Tribunal has been set aside and that of the appellate authority restored. It is against this decision that the appellant has come to this Court by special leave.

3. It is nec