Siddhartha Varma, J. - (1.) The petitioners are tenants of a shop situate in House No. SA - 1/96, Mohalla Pandeypur, Kharuji, City Varanasi, nd the respondent is the landlord of that very shop. The landlord/respondent filed a Release Application which was allowed on 22.7.2017 and the Appeal filed by the tenant was dismissed on 31.7.2018. Aggrieved thereof, the instant writ petition has been filed.
(2.) The Release Application was filed by the landlord stating that he genuinely and bonafidely required the shop in question to settle his son. However, the tenants had opposed the Release Application stating that there was no bonafide need of the landlord and had also stated that the building in question was exempted from the operation of the U.P. Urban Buildings (Regulation of Letting, Rent and Eviction) Act, 1972, inasmuch as after the shop was let out to their father Govind Ram Bhatiya in the year 1980, the shop and the building in which the shop was situate had undergone such additions that the existing building had become a minor part of the bigger building and, therefore, the tenanted accommodation had to be treated to have been constructed on the date when the bigger building had come into existence. In addition to the fact that the building was exempted from the operation of the U.P. Act No. 13 of 1972, the tenants also stated that the shop was not bonafidely needed by the landlord and that no affidavit to that effect had been filed by the son of the landlord for whose need the shop was being sought to be released.
(3.) The Prescribed Authority allowed the Release Application but did not address to the question as to whether the premises in which the tenant had his shop was exempted from the operation of the U.P. Act No. 13 of 1972. The Appellate Court, however, looked into this plea of the tenants that the accommodation was to be exempted from the operation of the U.P. Act No. 13 of 1972 but turned it down and also upheld the findings of the Trial Court that the accommodation was genuinely and bonafidely required by the landlord. The question of comparative hardship was also dealt with and was answered in favour of the landlord by both the Courts below.;