KEWAL SINGH v. LAJWANTI (2)

Citation: [1980] 1 S.C.R. 854

Court: Supreme Court of India

Bench: S. MURTAZA FAZAL ALI, P.S. KAILASAM, A.P. SEN

Case summary

Lastly, we come to the question of the application of Article 14 to the provisions of ·the Act. The Rent Controller accordingly allowed the plaintiff to withdraw the two causes of action mentioned in the application.

Judgment text

KEWAL SINGH "---.. v. LAJWANTI October 4, 1979 (S. MURTAZA FAZAL ALI, P. S. KAl:LASAM AND A. P. SEN, JJ. ] Frame of Suit-Whether earlier giving up a cause of action by deletion from the plaint and later on again requesting for inclusion of the same cause is barred by tile principle of Order II Rule 2 C. P. C. Doctrine of constructive Res-judicata-When it applies-Whether deletion of a cause of action from the plaint anti again a request for inclusion would amount to a bar of Res-judicata. Delhi Rent Control Act, Section 25B-Whether violative of Art. 14 of the Constitution. The appellant was the tenant of respondent in Quarter No. IV-H/46 Lajpat Nagar frqm 1-7~1967. On 2-6-1976, the respondent filed an application under Sections 14A(l), 14(l)(e) and· 14{1) (f) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, for eviction of the appellant firstly on the ground that as.

her husband was required by the Government to vacate the Government quarters or pay the penal rent, the husband of the respondent bad to shift ~o the house of his wife which was in the tenancy of the defendant. A prayer was also made that even othemise the premises were required for a bonafide necessity of the landlord and also as the premises had become unfit for human habitation the respondent required the same for carrying out repairs which could not be done unless the premises were vacated. On 3-6·76 the respondent filed :m application withdrawing the causa of action mentioned by her regarding bonafide necessity and repairs as contemplated by Section 14(l)(e) and 14(l)(f) of the Act. The Rent Controller accordingly allowed the plaintiff to withdraw the two ca·uses of action mentioned in the application since no notice was served at this time on the appeUant. Thereafter •otice was served on the appellant.

On 4-6-1976, the plaintiff again sought to amend her petition by deleting the cause of action mentioned under section 14A(l) of the Act i. e. requirement of the respondent because her husband had· been directed to vacate the Government Quarter. On 13-8-1976 the appellant • . . , ,. appeared before the Rent Controller and filed an appliaction under section 25B, sub sections 4 and 5 requesting the Rent Controller to give him permission to- ~. ' defend the suit, on the ground that as the landlady was not a Government servant she was not entitled to maintain the eviction petition under Section 14A(l) of the Act. On 6-10-76 the husband of the respondent filed an application for being impleaded a.

~ a party, but this application was rejected on 22-11-76; The resJ¥)ndent thereafter again filed another application on 27-1-77 praying for amendment of her eYiction application by re-inserting the cause of action con~ tained in section 14{1)(e) of the Act and sought to claim eviction on the ground' of bonafide requirement. . This application was contested by the appellant but was allowed by the Rent Controller by his order dated 19-2-77 leaving open to· the appellant to file his objection by a fresh application if he wanted to defend the suit. The appellant accordingly filed an application on 9-3-77 for permission to defend the suit on the ground that the amendment sought for by the pl-aintiff was uncalled for and illegal and could not be allowed. Ultimately, the Rent KEWAL SINGH V. LAJWANTI 855 controller by his order dated 27-7-77 rejected the application for leave to appear and defend the suit and passed an order evicting the appellant from the premises.

The revision petition filed by the appellant under Section 25B(8) in the Delhi High Court was dismissed on 6-4-1978 and hence the appeal by special leave of the Court. It was contended : (a) that the second application given by the respondent for .. re-amending her plaint by inserting the relief under section 14(1 )(e) which she B had given up at a prior occasion when she had based her suit under sectian · J 14A(l) was barred by the principles of Order II Rule 2 C. P. C. (b) that even if Order n Rule 2 C. P. C. , had no application, the second application filed by the respondent was barred by the doctrfne of constructive res-judicata and (c) Section 25B which lays down the procedure for disposing of the applications filed by the landlord under the provisions of Section 14A and 14(1)(e) are violative of Article 14 of the Constitution inoomuch as the provisions are arbic trary and discriminatory in nature, and seek tO provide tWQ different procedures for tenants similarly situated.

Dismissing the appeal by spcciai leave, the Court HELD : 1. A perusal of order II Rule 2 C. P. C. would clearly reveal that this provision applies to cases where a plaintiff omits to sue a portion @{ the cause of action on which the suit is based either by relinquishing the cause of . D action or by omitting a part of it. The provision has, therefore, no application to cases where the plaintiff has based his suit on separate and distinct oauses of action and chooses to relinquish one or the other of them. In such cases, it is always open to the plaintiff to file a fresh suit on the basis of a distinct cause of action [860 E-F] In the instant cese, the second amendment application was not barred by the E principles of order TI, Rule 2 C. P. C.

The respondent had first based her suit on three distinct causes of action, but later confined the suit only to the first cause of action, namely the one mentioned in Section 14A(l) of the Act and gave up the cause of action relating to section 14(1 )(e) and (f). Subsequently by virtue of an amendment she relinquished the fir§. t cause of action arising out of section 14A(l) •md sought to revive her cause of action based on section 14(1 )(e). At -the time when the respondent relinquished the cause of action arising out of p· Section 14(1)(e), the appcl4'nt was not in the picture at all. Therefore it was not open to the appellant to mise any objection to the amount sought by the respondent. [861 G·H, 862 A-C] Mohammed Khalil Khan and Ors. v. Mahbub Al! klwn and Ors. , 75 I. A. 121 P. C_. ; applied. 2. One of the essential conditions of res judicata is that there must be a G formal adjudication between the parties (jfter fu11 hearing.

In other words, the matter must be finally decided between the parties. [862 c]' In the instant case, the doctrine of constructive res-judicata has no application whatsoever, since at the time when the respondent relinquished her first cause of action, the appellant was no where in the picture and there was no adjudication H between the parties. The second amendment application wa'& ma ~ptember, 1975 that a person who owns his own house in his place of work should vacate the Government accommod emro,\•::r~d. tn 0Ctt. 'pt the service at the place where the tenant or h1s agent ncttnUy and voluntarily rcsidc:! s or carries 0:1 busint~ s or r·~rsonaUy works for gain and mn. y, if the .

~Trcumstnncl'S 0f th~ ca5:~ ~o rcq\Jirc; also direct tbe publica~ ~1on o~ the t';Ununl)ho;; in the Controller for recovery of possession of the premises: Nevertheless, the proviso to sub-section (8) confers on the High Court c a power of revision for satisfying itself whether or not the order made by the Controller is according to law. Sub-section (9) confers a power of review on the Controller where no application for revision has been filed before the High Court. Sub-section (10) provides that procedure mentioned above shall apply also to an application for eviction on the~ ground as specified in clause (e) of the proviso to D section 14 (1); That is to say bona. fide re4uirement of the landlord in respect of the tenanted premises. The comments by the learned counsel for th·~ appellant are first that there was no reason to discriminate the landlord suing for personal ne~essity by trying his application in a summary fasl\ion.

We have E already pointed out that the classification mad~ by section 2SB is a reasonable classification and cannot be said to be in any way discri~ minatory or arbitrary. Even though a summary procedure has been evolved the tenant has been afforded full opportunity to defend the application provided he q1n disclose good grounds for negativing the' case of the landlord. No litigant has a right to protract the legal proceedings by taking frivolous, irrelevant, irrational or uncalled for pleas. This is what the section seeks to prevent. ~ . . - I It was then argued by counsel for the appellant that where an •• application has been allowed for eviction of the tenant, no appeal or G second ap~al is provided by the Act. An appeal· is purely a creature of the statute and this right has hot been given in order to cut out unnecessary delay.

Instead the highest Court of the State has been given a wide power of revision where the said Court can examine the case of the tenant and the landlord and the validity of the order . passed by the Controller. The right of the tenant, therefore, is suffi- H ~iently safeguarded by the proviso to sub-section ( 8) of section 2SB ()f the Act referred to above. lrt order to give relief to the tenant I I ·. A against any apparent error of law or fact w:h. ere no revision has been filed in the High Court the statute confers power of review on the Controller. Thus taking an overall picture of the situation, the circumstances under which the landlord's needs have been classified and the safe- " guards given by the statute it cannot be said by any stretch of imagi: }k • B nation that section 25B and its sub-sections are violative of Articl~ J 14 of the Constitution of India, or that section 25B suffers from the vice of excessive delegation of powers.

In fact ~Section 25B contains valuable and sufficient guidelines which completely exclude the exer- . , . cise of u:rltanalised or arbitrary powers by the Rent Controller. As di~cussed above the rights of the tenants are sufficiently protected. c For instance if the tenant presents a plausible defence the plaintiff can be no'n suited if the defence is accepted by the Controller. The tenant however cannot claim a legal right to take all sorts of frivolous, baseless or irrelevant pleas which alone the statute bars. We have already indicated that summary procedure relates only to a particular D ground on the basis of which the landlord can seek eviction and does not apply to other grounds on which the tehant can be evicted. There is yet another important aspect of the matter which may b~ mentioned here. Prior to the enactment of the Rent Control legislation in our country, the relationship of landlord and tenant · was E governed by our common law viz.

the Transfer of Property Act '(Sections 107 to 111). The tenant was inducted with this tacit agreement to be regulated by the conditions embodied in the contract and could not be allowed to repudiate the agreement reached between · him and the landlord during that period. The tenant was, therefore, bound ih law to vacate the premises either voluntarily. or through a F suit after he was given a notice as required by the Transfer of Property Act under the terms and conditions of the lease. However, as a piece of social reform in order to protect the tenants from capricious and frivolous eviction, the legislature stepped in and afforded special protection to the· tenant by conferrihg on him the status of a statutory tenant who could not be evicted except under the conditions specified G and the procedure prescribed by the Rent Control Acts. ·'l"hus to this extent, the agreement of ]ease and the provisions of the Transfer of Property Act stood superseded.

At the Same time, the Rent Control Acts provided the facilities of eviction to the landlord on certain -s~ecified grounds like bona fide personal necessity or default in pay4 ment of ren~ etc. Thus any right that the tenant possessed after the H expiry of the lease was conferred on him only by vjrtue of the Rent Control Act. It is, therefore, manifest that if the legislature considered in its wisdom to confer certain rights or facilities on the tenants,. . ... KEWAL SINGH V. J,AJWANTI (Fazal Ali, J. ) . . . it could due to changed circumstances curtail, modify, alter or even take away such rights or the procedure enacted for the purpose of eviction and leave the tenants to seck their remedy under the commob Jaw. Thus, we do not sec how can the tenant crutllengc the validity of such a provision enacted by the legislature from which the tenant itself B derived such rights.

In the instant cnsc, the legislature h:lS n ot taken away the right of the tenant at all but has merely simpl:fi~d the procedure for eviction of · tbe tcn:~nt in cases falling within the ambit of Sections 14A & 14(1) (e) of the Act as discussed in the judgment. In these circumstances, c th~refore, any challenge by the tenant to the constitutionality of the Act ·must necessarily fail and hence Scctio·o 25B is constitutionally valid. ·. · For these reasons, therefore, all lhe . contentions raised by the appellant fail nnd tbc appeal is dismi~ed. But in the peculiar circwnstances of the case there will be no order as to costs. Time till D 31-5-1980 is given to the tenant to hand O't-er peaceful and vacant possession to tho landlord on filing an undert. aking to this Court within a month accompanied by nn affidavit that be would do so on the date tiled and shall not imluct any other person on the preoilies.

The temnt will, during this period, coutin~ to pay the compensation for E wrongful use of the premises equivalent to lhe nmount of the rent and clear all arrears. V. D. K. Appeal dismi. tsed.