- (1.) RESPONDENTS 4 to 7 are tenants of a building in the City of Kanpur. They were paying rent to the petitioner. Subsequently, they made an application under Section 30 (2) of the U. P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction) Act, 1972 for permission to deposit the rent in Court on the assertion that a notice given by respondents 2 and 3 had been received by them whereby they were required to pay rent of the tenement under their tenancy to respondents 2 and 3 and as such a bona fide doubt or dispute had arisen as to the person who is entitled to receive rent in respect of the building in their occupation. Certain rent was also deposited by respondents 4 to 7 under the said sub- section (2) of Section 30. Thereafter a notice was issued to the petitioner as contemplated by sub- section (5) of Section 30. On the receipt of the notice, it was contended on behalf of the petitioner that he was the landlord of the building in question, that it was he who had let out the accommodation to respondents 4 to 7 and that respondents 2 and 3 had no concern with the said building. The Munsif accepted the contention of the petitioner and dismissed the application under Section 30. Since respondents 4 to 7 had made separate applications under Section 30, they filed four different revisions before the District Judge against the order of the Munsif. The Fourth Additional District Judge, to whom these revisions appear to have been transferred for disposal, allowed these revisions on September 18, 1974. It is this order of the Additional District Judge which is sought to be quashed in the present writ petition.
(2.) IN view of the submissions made by counsel for the parties the following points arise for consideration:- 1. Whether any inquiry is contemplated by Section 30 of the aforesaid Act to find out if a bona fide doubt or dispute as to the person who is entitled to receive the rent has arisen or the mere assertion of the tenant in this behalf is conclusive. 2. Whether the Additional District Judge has decided the case in accordance with the requirements of Section 30 aforesaid. Having heard counsel for the parties, I am of opinion that the submission made by counsel for the petitioner that the order of the Additional District Judge deserves to be quashed is well founded. By Section 43 (1) of the U. P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction) Act, 1972 (hereinafter referred to as the new Act), the U. P. (Temporary) Control of Rent and Eviction Act, 1947 (hereinafter referred to as the old Act) was repealed. Section 7-C of the old Act with the exception to be taken notice of subsequently was almost in pari materia to Section 30 of the new Act. The provision contained in Section 7-C has been interpreted by this Court in several decided cases and in my opinion they would be useful for the determination of the first point referred to above. In Fateh Chand v. S. B. Goel, (1967 All LJ 979) which was a case arising out of proceedings under Section 7-C (1) of the old Act, a similar submission was made before a Division Bench of this Court as has been made by counsel for respondents 2 to 7 before me, namely, that after notices had been served on the landlord under sub-section (4) of Section 7-C of the old Act it was not open to the Munsif to decide the question as to whether the landlord has refused to accept any rent lawfully paid to him by the tenant even though such question had been raised by the landlord. This contention was repelled by the Division Bench. Agreeing with the decision of S. D. Singh, J. in an earlier case it was held, "Suffice it to say that we are in full agreement with his view that two facts, viz., whether the person who made the deposit was a tenant and that the landlord has refused to accept rent lawfully paid to him were jurisdictional facts which must exist to entitle a tenant to take recourse to clause (1) of Section 7-C of the Act. Before issuing notice to the landlord under Clause (4) of Section 7-C of the Act the learned Munsif will no doubt satisfy himself as to whether these two facts were prima facie made out by the application made by the tenant, but when notice to the landlord is issued under Clause (4) and the landlord appears before the Munsif and files an objection questioning the existence of any of the two jurisdictional facts, it will not only be within the powers of the learned Munsif but indeed the duty of the learned Munsif to go again into the question as to whether or not the jurisdictional facts necessary to enable him to act under Clause (1) of Section 7-C of the Act exist."
(3.) COUNSEL for respondents 2 to 7 tried to distinguish that case on the ground that it was a case under Section 7-C (1) of the old Act which was analogous to Section 30 (1) of the new Act and not a case under Section 7-C (2) of fine old Act which is analogous to Section 30 (2) of the new Act. Reliance in support of this submission was placed on the following observations in Fateh Chand's case (1967 All LJ 979) (supra) :- "We desire to avoid being understood as expressing any opinion in regard to the correctness or otherwise of the aforesaid decisions relating to a deposit under Clause (2)." ;