Hari Swarup, J. - (1.) THIS is landlord's petition challenging the order of the District Judge passed in appeal under Section 22 of the U.P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction), Act, 1972, (hereinafter called the Act). The Petitioner made an application under Section 21 of the Act for ejectment of the tenant from a shop in the building. The application was allowed by the Prescribed Authority. The tenant went up in appeal. The appeal was allowed and the application was rejected.
(2.) THE Petitioner had applied for the accommodation on the ground that it was needed for being occupied by her father -in -law. An objection was raised before the appellate court to the effect that an application could not be moved for ejectment of a tenant under Section 21 of the Act on the ground that it was needed for the occupation of the father -in -law of a landlord. The point was overruled by the appellate court, but the appeal was allowed on the ground that the need of the landlord was on merits not proved to be genuine. The petition was filed on the ground that the finding about the need by the appellate court is erroneous. It is not open in writ proceeding to look into the questions of fact. The writ petition cannot therefore, be allowed on that ground. Moreover, in the present case the landlord's application under Section 21 of the Act was not maintainable under law. The application could not be made for providing accommodation to the father -in -law of the landlord. Even though the appellate court has taken the view 1o the contrary, it has arrived at the correct conclusion in dismissing the application under Section 21 of the Act, and hence no interference can be made.
(3.) THE relevant portion of Section 21 of the Act runs as under: The Prescribed Authority may, on an application of the landlord in that behalf, order the eviction of a tenant from the building under tenancy or any specified part thereof if it is satisfied that any of the following grounds exists, namely: (a) that the building is bona fide required...by the landlord for occupation by himself or any member of his family, or any person for whose benefit it is held by him, for residential purposes. Application under Section 21 of the Act could, therefore, be maintainable only if the accommodation was needed either for the occupation of the landlord himself or by any member of her family. In the present case it was alleged to be needed for the occupation by the father -in -law of the landlord. The question, therefore, is whether the father -in -law of the present Petitioner could be deemed to be a member of her family. Family has been defined in Section 3 of the Act in Clause (g) in the following terms: "family", in relation to a landlord or tenant of a building, means, his or her - (i) spouse, (ii) male lineal descendants, (iii) such parents, grand parents & any unmarried or widowed or divorced or judicially separated daughter or daughter of a male lineal descendant, as may have been normally residing with him or her, and includes, in relation to a landlord, any female having a legal right of residence in that building;" Obviously father -in -law is not included in any of the categories. The contention of the learned Counsel for the Petitioner, however, is that the word 'parents' in category (iii) includes parents -in -law. I am unable to accept the contention because the word 'parents' must be read with the opening clause which will then mean 'her parents' and not the parents of her husband, and if the landlord is a male, it would mean his parents and not the parents of his wife. Therefore, though the father -in -law may be a relation he cannot be the landlords parent. As quoted in the Stroud's Judicial Dictionary, Fourth Edition, Volume 2, page 1021: "(1) Father, grandfather, mother, grandmother, child, as those words were used in the statutes, Poor Relief Act, 1601 (c. 2), Section 7; Poor Relief 1819 (c. 12) Section 26, relating to the maintenance of poor relations, meant only such of those persons as were legitimately related to a poor person by blood, e.g. a man was not liable to maintain his mother -in -law or his daughter -in -law (R.V. Munden, Strange, 3rd ed., 189, and cases cited in note; R.V. Dempson, ibid. 954). The meaning of the word 'parent' has been defined in Chambers Twentieth Century Dictionary, New Edition 1972 as under: One who begets or brings fourth; a father or a mother; one who, or that which, produces; that from which anything springs or branches.... "Father -in -law and a mother -in -law" cannot, therefore, be treated as the parent of the landlord. When the legislature defines a particular word to mean a particular thing, it is not open to courts to import a fiction of law and by that fiction add new categories to the definition given by the legislature; it cannot thus be legitimate for the court to enlarge by interpretation the definition by adding the words 'parents of the spouse' in the definition of the word 'family'. If the court does so, it will be legislating and not interpreting. It is thus not possible to include, in the word 'family' the parents -in -law of the landlord.;