- (1.) THE Full Bench is called upon to determine and decide the following question of law as referred to by Tewatia, J. (as he then was) in his reference order dated August 28, 1975: "whether a landlord applying for the eviction of his tenant on the ground contained in sub-paragraphs (b) and (c) of paragraph (i) of section 13 (3) (a) of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949, (hereinafter called the Act), i. e. for his own use and occupation, has or has not to specifically plead in his application the contents of sub-paragraphs (b) and (c) aforesaid, which put a rider on the right of the landlord to get the eviction of his tenant from the premises even for his own use unless he succeeds in proving that he was not in occupation of another residential building in the same urban area and that he had not vacated any such building after the commencement of the Act without any sufficient cause. " Reference has not been made to the facts of the revision petition in the reference order as only the abovementioned legal question was raised and in view of the conflicting decisions of this Court and some other High Courts, the learned Judge was of the opinion that the question required authoritative pronouncement to clear the confusion and conflict of opinion as well as for the benefit of the Subordinate Courts. Under the circumstances, it is not necessary to advert to the facts of the said revision petition.
(2.) AT this stage, the relevant provisions which need interpretation may be reproduced: "13 (1) A tenant in possession of a building or rented land shall not be evicted therefrom in execution of a decree passed before or after the commencement of this Act or otherwise and whether before or after the termination of the tenancy, except in accordance with the provisions of this section or in pursuance of an order made under section 13 of the Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1947, as subsequently amended (2) ** ** ** ** ** ** (3) (a) A landlord may apply to the Controller for an order directing the tenant to put the landlord in possession -- (i) in the case of a residential building if,-- (a) he requires it for his own occupation; (b) he is not occupying another residential building in the urban area concerned; and (c) he has not vacated such a building without sufficient cause after the commencement of this act, in the said urban area. "
(3.) THE earliest decision having bearing on the matter in controversy is by bishan Narain, J. , in Civil Revn. No. 372 of 1966 (Lakhi Ram v. Piare Lal), decided on April 28, 1958 (Punj), wherein the application by the landlord for the eviction of the tenant on the ground of bona fide need for personal occupation was dismissed by both the Rent Controller and the Appellate Authority. The landlord did not make any allegation, relating to Sub-clauses (b) and (c) of the aforesaid provision, in his application. The tenant also did not make any reference regarding the same in his reply. No issue regarding the same was framed by the Rent Controller. One of the contentions of the learned counsel for the landlord-petitioner in the revision petition was that the eviction application had been dismissed on a ground regarding which no issue had (been framed. This contention was upheld by Bishan Narain, J. , and it was held that no amount of evidence could be looked into upon a plea which was never put forward. It was further held that it will be extremely unfair in the absence of a specific issue to non-suit the landlord. Thus, the revision petition was accepted and the case was remanded back after framing new issues with reference to sub-clauses (b) and (c) of the Act. In Krishan Lal Seth v. Pritam Kumari, (1961) 63 Pun LR 865, the Division Bench comprising of Mehar Singh and Mahajan, JJ. , after taking into consideration the abovementioned decision rendered by Bishan Narain, J. , came to the conclusion and held that it was not necessary to allege and plead anything referred to in sub-clauses (b) and (c) of the aforesaid provision. The ratio of the decision in krishan Lal Seth's case (supra) is the sole basis of one view of the question involved and is reproduced below in extenso: "the learned counsel has drawn our attention to the observation of the learned Judges that 'the scope of enquiry by the judicial and quasi-judicial tribunals is normally confined to the disputes set out by the contesting parties in their respective pleadings; in other words, the rights and liabilities of the parties as they exist on the date of the initiation of the proceedings alone fall within the scope of the investigation of which the tribunal is seized, and it is generally incompetent for a tribunal to adjudicate upon any controversial matter which does not find place in the pleadings of the parties'. As a general statement of law this is unexceptional. However, the ground for eviction under Section 13 (3) (a) (i) from a residential building is the requirement by the landlord of the building for his own occupation and the Sub-clause adds two statutory conditions to this ground before it can toe successfully urged to obtain eviction. Such statutory conditions obviously must be established by the landlord, but as the conditions are provided by the statute it is not necessary to repeat them in the pleadings. The object of requiring the parties to be confined to their pleadings is to avoid surprise to the opposite party, and in regard to a prayer for the eviction on the ground of requirement of residential building by a landlord for his own occupation, there can possibly be no surprise if paras (b) and (c) of sub-clause (i) of Clause (a) of Section 13 (3) are not repeated in the application, for such conditions are provided by the statute and are available for the knowledge of the tenant from the perusal of the statute. Thus it was not necessary for the landlord to restate in the application those statutory conditions and for her omission to refer to those conditions her application could not possibly be dismissed. There could not be any ground for surprise to the tenant and there is no justification for dismissal of the application for the mere omission to reproduce the statutory conditions in the application. This argument is without substance and is discarded. " The decision in Krishan Lal Seth's case (supra) was followed by Pandit, J. , (as he then was) in Dev Raj v. Tilak Raj Dharam Pal, 1973 Cur LJ 557 (Punj) and the revision petition of the tenant was dismissed though there was no averment in the eviction application regarding Sub-clauses (b) and (c) of Section 13 of the Act. The learned Judge without any discussion, relying upon the above-mentioned Division Bench decision only held as under: "under the law, it was not necessary to mention these things in the application. " tewatia, J. , (as he then was) also relied upon the ratio of the above-mentioned decision by the Division Bench while deciding Civil Revn. No. 529 of 1973 (Gurdit Singh v. Shankar Lal Misra), decided on July 15, 1975 (Punj ).;