SURYA KANT,J - (1.) THIS Revision Petition is directed against the judgment and order dated 28.8.1982 passed by the learned Appellate Authority, Rohtak whereby the petitioners have been ordered to be evicted from the demised premises on the ground that petitioner No. 1 has sub-let the same to his brother, namely, petitioner No. 2.
(2.) IT may be noticed here that the eviction petition preferred by the respondent-landlord under the Haryana Urban (Control of Rent and Eviction) Act, 1973 (in short the Act) was dismissed by the Rent Controller vide his order dated May 26, 1981. Shop bearing No. 6/88, Ward-6, M.C. Bahadurgarh was rented out by the respondent-landlord to petitioner No. 1 somewhere in the year 1976. The respondent sought ejectment of the petitioner No. 1 on the grounds that :- (i) he is in arrears of rent from 1.6.1978 till date @ Rs. 125/- per month; and (ii) has sub-let the shop to his brother, namely, respondent No. 2 to whom exclusive possession thereof has been given without the written consent of the landlord. The petitioners contested the petition on both counts. It is not in dispute that the arrears of rent were tendered on the first date of hearing and, thus, the first ground of eviction was no longer available to the landlord. As regards the second ground, namely, sub-letting of the premises, the petitioners hotly contested and averred that they being brothers were joint in food and lodging with their parents and petitioner No. 2 after completing his schooling, had started helping the first petitioner in his business which stood expanded with the passage of time. The petitioners specifically averred that petitioner No. 1 had not parted with the possession of the demised premises and continued to be in actual physical possession thereof.
(3.) IN order to discharge the initial onus that the original tenant, namely, petitioner No. 1 had parted with the possession of the shop in favour of petitioner No. 2, the respondent-landlord examined one Sant Lal (AW1) as his first witness who, however, appears to have fired back and deposed that the shop was rented out to Bimal Kumar, petitioner No. 1 and Bimal Kumar is paying the rent to the landlord till today and it is he alone who is doing business in the said shop. The landlord's attorney Satish Chander (AW2), of course, supported the landlord's version and alleged that Sunil Kumar (petitioner No. 2) is working on the shop from the last 4 - 5 years though the rent was always being paid by Bimal Kumar. He further deposed that upto 1978, Bimal Kumar continued to pay the rent but later on told him to realize the same from Sunil Kumar to whom the business had been allegedly entrusted. According to this witness, petitioner No. 1 also handed over to him a photostat copy of the application for transfer of the subject business in the name of Sunil Kumar. He denied the suggestion that Bimal Kumar and Sunil Kumar are joint in food, lodging or business as according to this witness, Bimal Kumar is running his business in another shop since the year 1978. Tara Chand (AW3) was the third witness who deposed on the same lines as Satish Chander(AW2). Roshan Lal (AW4) produced Form-D which was marked as "B" and is signed by Sunil Kumar - petitioner No. 2. Besides this, the respondent placed on record certified copies of the voters list for the year 1980 (Ex. P-2 and P-3) in order to show that petitioner No. 1 was living separately from his father. He also produced Ex.PX, which is form ST-15 dated 23.6.1976 and appears to have been signed by petitioner No. 2.;