Chakravartti, C.J:— Certain attractive questions of law were raised in this Rule, but in our view the petitioner is debarred from urging them in view of the facts of the case.
2. An order under s. 14(4) was made against the petitioner on August 17, 1951. It appears that in his defence in the suit, he has taken a plea that there is no relationship of landlord and tenant between him and the opposite party. Mr. Bose, who appears for the petitioner, contended that since that defence had been taken in the written statement, there could not be any question of making any order under s. 14(4) till the issue raised by that defence was decided against his client and it was held that he was, in fact, a tenant. That contention appears to me to be right. The Rent Act can apply only to tenants. In fact, s. 14(4) itself says that an order under that section will be made if the “tenant” contests the suit. If the person, sued as a tenant, pleads that he is not a tenant, then till that question is decided against him there can be no question of proceedings against him as a tenant or applying to him s. 14(4) or any other provision of the Rent Act. While that is quite true, it appears to me that the petitioner has precluded himself by his own act from raising the plea against the order now made against him. It appears that although he has taken in his written statement the defence, to which I have already referred, he practically abandoned it in his objection to the application made by the opposite party for an order under s. 14(4). Apart from that, he seems himself to have been the petitioner in a proceeding for standardization of the rent which could be only on the footing that he was putting himself forward as a tenant under the opposite party. In his objection to the application of the opposite party for an order under s. 14(4), be did not say that he was not a tenant, but only said that the rent was not what the opposite party was asserting it to be, but a lower amount. He even referred to the proceeding for standardization which he himself had initiated and to an application for revision which was then pending in this Court.
3. The position, therefore, is that the petitioner contested the application under s. 14(4) on the footing that he was a tenant and, secondly, after the order was made against him, he submitted to it and went oh making payments under it for quite a considerable length of time. It his contention was, as now urged before us, that no order under s. 14(4) could have been made against him at all till his defence that he was not a tenant was overruled, he should have moved this Court against the order made on August 17, 1951 Not having done so and, in fact, having submitted to it during a number of months, it is not open to him to turn round at this stage and avoid the result of the default he has admittedly committed by setting up the plea that s. 14(4) does not apply to his case at all.
4. It was further contended that even if his defence was liable to be struck out, it could not be the whole defence, nor could it be the whole defence against ejectment. But the defence against ejectment only has been struck out and not the whole defence. The contention was that what s. 14(4) contemplated was only defence against ejectment on the ground mentioned in s. 12(1) (i) of the Act and not also other defences against ejectment.
5. I am unable to give effect to that contention. The language of s. 14(4) is in no way qualified. The policy of the section or, indeed, the whole Act seems to be that the Legislature is not minded to protect a tenant who will not even pay the monthly rent regularly. If the tenant, on being directed to pay the current rent month by month, does not do so, the Act quite clearly provides that he will by such conduct forfeit the special protection which the Act confers on tenants and will be relegated to his position under the general law. I do not find any justification in the language of s. 14(4) to limit the defence against ejectment contemplated by it to defence against ejectment only on the ground mentioned in s. 12(1) (i) of the Act.
6. For the reasons given above, this Rule is discharged with costs—the hearing-fee being assessed at two gold mohurs.
Sinha, J.:— I agree.
A.K.D.G