- (1.) The petitioner seeks to assail the orders for eviction and other reliefs passed against him by the Estate Officer under the provisions of the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupants) Act, 1971 and affirmed on appeal by the Chief Judge, City Civil Court and the main brunt of his attack is that the impugned orders are bad for violation of the rules of Natural Justice. It is not easy to appreciate the significance of the adjective Natural qualifying the word Justice in the expression "Natural Justice". I would have thought that unnatural justice is a contradiction in terms. Natural Justice is not something like the Law of Nature or Jus Natural of the Romans, some sort of a hypothetical law of an ideal nature of the golden age. The principles that go by the name of Rules of Natural Justice are very much the principles of Justice simpliciter which any adjudicatory authority required to administer justice would have to observe, unless such observance is ruled out by express legislative enunciation or irresistible implication. These are so fundamental in all Judicial exercises that the appellation "Natural" to these principles is somewhat irrelevant and also confusing.
(2.) However sombre and high-sounding the expression Natural Justice may look or sound, its principles have got nothing to do with substantive Justice or substantive due process (to borrow an American term), but relate rather to the adjectival or procedural part of the Justice-delivery system. All the Rules of Natural Justice, by and large, appear to be amplifications of the two principles epitomised in two Latin Maxims (1) Nemo Debet Jude Essex in Propria Causa, and (2) Audi Alteram Partem, the first meaning that no one should be judge in his own cause, and the second meaning that the other party has got to be heard. The second has an affirmative mandate providing that no order, judicial, quasi judicial, or even administrative, involving any civil consequence shall be passed without affording the party affected a reasonable opportunity of being heard and the first conveys a negative mandate providing that such hearing must not be made by one who has any personal or pecuniary interest or any bias in the matter.
(3.) Vivian Bose, J. in the Supreme Court decision in Sangram Singh v. Election Tribunal, AIR 1955 SC 425 at p. 429 explained the second principle of the rules of Natural Justice thus :- "there must be ever present to the mind the fact that our laws of procedure are grounded on a principles of natural justice which requires that men should not be condemned unheard, that decisions should not be reached behind their backs, that proceedings that affect their lives and property should not continue in their absence and that they should not be precluded from participating in them. Of course, there must be exceptions and where they are clearly defined they must be given effect to. But taken by and large and subject to that proviso, our laws of procedure should be construed, wherever that is reasonably possible, in the light of that principle." Venkatarama Ayyar, J. speaking for a unanimous five Judge Bench in Union of India v. T.R.Verma, AIR 1957 SC 882 at p.885 explained the second principle as hereunder :- "Stating it broadly and without intending it to be exhaustive, it may be observed that rules of natural justice require that a party should have the opportunity of adducing all relevant evidence on which he relies, that the evidence of his opponent should be taken in his presence and that he should be given the opportunity of cross-examining the witnesses examined by that party, and that no materials should be relied on against him without his being given an opportunity of explaining them." In the case at hand, the impugned orders of eviction and for arrears of rent against the petitioner have been passed by the Estate Officer under the provisions of S.5 and S.7 of the Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorised Occupants) Act, 1971, and have been confirmed on appeal by the Chief Judge, City Civil Court, under S.9 of the Act. The Act is no longer open to challenge on the ground of providing a special forum and a different procedure for eviction of unauthorised occupants from "Public Premises" as defined in the Act, in view of the seven Judge-Bench decisions of the Supreme Court in Maganlal Chhagganlal, AIR 1974 SC 2009. The Act and the Rules framed thereunder provide for reasonable opportunities of being heard in consonance with the principles of natural justice on which our general Laws of Procedure are by and large grounded and it has not been urged by the petitioner that he was denied or deprived of any such opportunity.;