- (1.) JUDGEMENT This is plaintiff s application in revision under Section 115 of the Code of Civil Procedure for setting aside the judgment and decree of the District Judge and to restore the judgment and decree of the trial court.
(2.) THE plaintiff-applicant filed a suit for recovery of arrears of rent and ejectment against the defendant-opposite party. The defendant contested the suit on the ground that the plaintiff had no title to the house in question and he was not entitled to rent and that no relationship of landlord and tenant existed between the parties. The trial court decreed the plaintiff s suit. On revision-application under Section 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act by the defendant, the District Judge set aside the trial court s decree and dismissed the plaintiff s suit. Aggrieved, the plaintiff has preferred this revision. Learned counsel for the applicant urged that the District Judge exceeded his jurisdiction in re-appraising the evidence and interfering with the findings of fact recorded by the trial court. The contention was that the District Judge while exercising jurisdiction under Section 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act had no jurisdiction to re-appraise the evidence or to interfere with the findings of the trial court. While repelling the defendant s contention, the trial court had recorded a finding that the plaintiff was entitled to sue the defendants for the recovery of the arrears of rent and ejectment as he was transferee of Basant Lal, Mukund Lal and Amrit Lal who were the recorded owners of the house. It further recorded finding that since the defendant had not paid any rent to the plaintiff, who had given notice to the defendant after the sale-deed was executed in his name by the original owners of the house, he was a defaulter. On appraisal of evidence on record it further recorded a finding that the defendant was plaintiffs tenant and the relationship of landlord and tenant existed between the parties. The District Judge considered the evidence both oral and documentary in detail and thereafter he recorded a finding that the plaintiff s case that the defendant was tenant and that he had agreed to pay Rs. 35/- per mensem as rent to him, was false and unbelievable. He further recorded a finding that although the defendant was in occupation of the house, he was not the plaintiff s tenant, and as such, the suit for recovery of arrears of rent and ejectment against the plaintiff had wrongly been decreed by the trial court. The learned District Judge observed that the finding of the trial court was wholly perverse and deserved to be set aside.
(3.) SECTION 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act lays down that the court may satisfy itself that a decree made in any case decided by a Court of Small Causes was according to law. The court while exercising powers under Section 25 of the Small Cause Courts Act must confine itself to ascertain as to whether the decree of the Judge, Small Cause Court was according to law. While exercising the jurisdiction it is not open to the court to re-assess the evidence or to substitute its own conclusion of fact in place of that reached by the Judge Smell Cause Court although it is open to the court to satisfy itself that there was no miscarriage of justice due to mistake of law. In Hari Shankar v. Girdhari Lal (AIR 1963 SC 698), the scope of Sec. 35 of the Delhi and Ajmer Rent (Control) Act, 1952 which conferred revisional power on the High Court to satisfy itself that the decision of the court below was according to law, was considered. The Supreme Court held that under Section 35, High Court could not interfere with the plain finding of fact arrived at by the courts below as the phrase according to law did not contemplate re-assessment of the value of the evidence or substitution of the findings of fact in place of those reached by the court below.;