- (1.)Leave granted.
(2.)I have had the privilege of going through the elaborate Order proposed by my Esteemed Brother J.S. Khehar, J. While I entirely agree with the view that the power to strike out the defence vested in the Court under Section 15 (7) of the Delhi Rent Control Act is discretionary and ought to be exercised only when the tenant deliberately, contumaciously or negligently fails to deposit the rent due from him, I have, however, not been able to persuade myself to hold that such deliberate, neglect or contumacious failure has been established against the petitioner-tenant in the instant case so as to justify the exceptional step of the Court striking out his defence at the threshold.
(3.)The facts giving rise to the controversy have been set out at great length in the judgment of my Erudite Brother. I, therefore, do not consider it necessary to recapitulate the same over again except to the extent it may be necessary in the course of this judgment to do so. Before adverting to the factual matrix relevant to the question of striking out the tenant's defence, we need to remind ourselves of the spirit underlying the Rent Control Legislations in general and Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 in particular. The historical perspective in which these legislations came about has been traced in several decisions of this Court. Nagindas Ramdas v. Dalpatram Ichharam @ Brijram and Ors., 1974 1 SCC 242 is one such decision in which this Court traced the historical compulsions that led to the enactment of the rent laws in this country. The broad policy underlying these laws including the Delhi Rent Control Act, observed this Court, was to protect the tenants against unreasonable demands of the landlords as to rents, evictions and repairs. The following passage is an apposite reminder of the times that saw the enactment of these laws and the purpose underlying the same:
"...The strain of the last World War, Industrial Revolution, the large-scale exodus of the working people to urban areas and the social and political changes brought in their wake social problems of considerable magnitude and complexity and their concomitant evils. The country was faced with spiralling inflation, soaring cost of living, increasing urban population and scarcity of accommodation. Rack renting and large scale eviction of tenants under the guise of the ordinary law, exacerbated those conditions making the economic life of the community unstable and insecure. To tackle these problems and curb these evils, the Legislatures of the States in India enacted Rent Control legislations...

...The language of the preambles of the Delhi Rent Act and Madras Rent Act is strikingly similar. The broad policy and purpose as indicated in their preambles is, substantially the same viz., "to protect tenants against their landlords in respect of the rents, evictions and repairs". With the same beneficent end in view, all the three Acts interfere with contractual tenancies and make provisions for fixation of fair and standard rents, or protection against eviction of tenants not only during the continuance of their contractual tenure but also after its determination. Indeed, the neologism "statutory tenant" has come into existence because of this protective policy which is common to all enactments of this kind..."