- (1.) The present second appeal filed by tenant Gopal Krishna s/o late Shri Govind Ram & other legal representatives of original tenant Goving Ram has been filed against the plaintiff landlord Kishan Lal s/o of Shri Ram Niwas Samdani on 20/7/2009 under Section 100 CPC aggrieved by the judgment and eviction decree of the first appellate court of learned Addl. District Judge No.2, Bhilwara in Civil Appeal No. 12/2005 allowing landlord Kishan Lal's appeal against the judgment & decree of learned trial court in civil suit No. 45/78 (Kishan Lal vs. Govind Ram) on 12/3/1993 dismissing the eviction suit in respect of a shop situated at Bhopalganj, Bhilwara inter alia on the ground of bonafide and reasonable necessity of the landlord Ram Niwas Samdani and his son present respondent - landlord Kishan Lal.
(2.) The long channel of litigation in rent control and eviction matters is truly reflected in the present case where the eviction suit filed way back on 12/1/1978, 34 years back, has now landed before this Court, possibly meeting its final fate at the admission stage of the present second appeal, which too after three years of its finally passing through the hurdles of interim applications, with insistence of the Court to let the matter be first argued for admission, has been heard for approximately five hours at admission stage and is being disposed of by this order. Such is the art and aura of the counsels, who have appeared throughout the trial of the present eviction suit, the lengthy litigation channels, creepy & lethargic system and hiccups of interlocutory applications and their disposals taking its own toll of lengthening the arrival time of fruits of litigation for the landlord, who sought eviction for his own personal and bonafide need to set up his own cloth business in the present suit shop.
(3.) One is reminded of the observations of Hon'ble Apex Court in the case of Gaya Prasad vs.Pradeep Srivastava, 2001 2 SCC 604, wherein, the Supreme Court lamented over the excessively long time period taken in such matters and expressing its anguish observed that many many events are bound to take place for landlord or for his family members during the pendency of such litigation and thereby such events cannot be held to obliterate his bonafide need and, therefore, the crucial date for deciding the bonafide need shall be the date of filing of the suit & the Apex Court upheld the eviction decree. The relevant para 10 of the said judgment is quoted below for ready reference: "10. We have no doubt that the crucial date for deciding as to the bona fides of the requirement of the landlord is the date of his application for eviction. The antecedent days may perhaps have utility for him to reach the said crucial date of consideration. If every subsequent development during the post petition period is to be taken into account for judging the bona fides of the requirement pleaded by the landlord there would perhaps be no end so long as the unfortunate situation in our litigative slow process system subsists. During 23 years after the landlord moved for eviction on the ground that his son needed the building, neither the landlord nor his son is expected to remain idle without doing any work, lest, joining any new assignment or starting any new work would be at the peril of forfeiting his requirement to occupy the building. It is a stark reality that the longer is the life of the litigation the more would be the number of developments sprouting up during the long interregnum. If a young entrepreneur decides to launch a new enterprise and on that ground he or his father seeks eviction of a tenant from the building, the proposed enterprise would not get faded out by subsequent developments during the traditional lengthy longevity of the litigation. His need may get dusted, patina might stick on its surface, nonetheless the need would remain intact. All that is needed is to erase the patina and see the gloss. It is pernicious,and we may say, unjust to shut the door before an applicant just on the eve of his reaching the finale, after passing through all the previous levels of the litigation, merely on the ground that certain developments occurred pendente lite, because the opposite party succeeded in prolonging the matter for such unduly long period.";