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.BALDBV SAHA! BANOIA

v.

R.C. BHASIN

April 16, 1982

[S. MURTAZA FAZAL ALI AND A. VARADARAJAN, JJ.]

Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958-S. J4(J)(d)-Appllcotion for ejectment of

tenant-Tenant ceasing to resid1 In premises. for ~ver six months-Whan

maintainable.'

Words and phrase;,-'Members of faml/y'-Who are-S. T4(JJ(d) .of Delhi

Rent Control Act, 1958.

A landlord is entitled to recover possession of the premises Jet for

residential purpose under s. 14(l)(d) of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958, if he

can show that neither the tenant nor any member

of his

family has been residing

therein for a period

of six months immediately before the date of the

filing of

the application.

The appellant took the house in question on ·Jease in May, 1961 and

E lived there with his parents, sisters and a brother. He went to Canada in 1971~

leaving behind in. the house, his mother ~nd brother, who continued to pay the

rent.

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The landlord filed an application for ejectment of tenant under s. 14(1)(d)

of the Delhi Rent Control Act in September. 1972 contending that with the

migration

of the tenant to Canada, his mother

11nd brother i:ould not be treated

as members of the ap'pellant's family. Tbe application was dismissed by the Rent

ControJler who found that t.be mother, brother and sister of the appellant were

undoubtedly residing in the disputed premises along with the appellant and

continued to reside there even on the date when the action for ejectment·was

brought.

The landlord's appeal against the order

of the Rent ControJJer was

a11owcd by the Rent Control Tribunal which ordered eviction of the

family

members of the appellant from the tenanted house.

The appeal

of the family

members against the order of eviction was

dismissed

by the High Court on

the ground that after the exit of the main tenant

to Canada, neither the mother nor the brother

or the sister could be

legally

termed as a member of the family of the appellant.

AJ1owin$ the appeal,

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B.S. BANGIA V. R.C. BHASIN 611

HELD : I. (a) The Act affords intrinsic evidence to show that the non­

applicants were undoubtedly members of the family residing in the house and

the misration of the main tenant' to Canada would make no difference. [674 HJ

(b) The term 'family' [has to be given not a restricted but · a wider

m~aning. There are abundant authorities to show that the term 'family' should

always ho liberally and broadly lccnstrued so as to include near relations of tho

A

head of the family. A beneficial provision must be meaningfully construed so B

as to advance the object of tho Act. [676 F; 678 El

Price v. Gould and Ors., [1930].Vol. 143 Law Times 333; G. V. Shukla v.

Shri Prabhu Ram Sukhram Dass Ojha, [1963]' P.I.R. (Vol. LXV) 256; Govlnd

. Dass and Ors. v. Ku/dip Singh, A.J.R.1971Delhi151 and Hira Lai and Ors. v.

Banarsi Dass, [1979] I R.L.R. 466 referred to.

(c) The Act has manifested its intention by virtue of a later amendment.

Tho definition of 'tenant' inserted in s~ 2(1) of the Act by the Amending Act

18 of 1976 expressly included 'parents' in sub-clause (iii) thereof and also

indicated that .apart from the heirs 'of the tenant s.,Ccificd therein, even those

persons who had been ordinarily 1ivina: in the premises with the tenant would

be treated as members of the family. [675 B; 677 H; 678 A]

2. (a) The legislature has advisedly provided that any member of the

rami1y residing therein for a period of six months immediately before the date

of the filing of the action would be treated as a tenant. The stress is not so

much on the actual presence o( the tenant as on the fact that the members of the

family actually live and reside in the tenanted premises. Clause (d) of s. 14(1)

of the Act is a special concession given to the landlord to obtain possession· Cly

where the tenanted premises have been compl~tely vacated by the tenant. ·

[676 G-H; 677 A]

(b) The landlord bad failed to prove the essential ingredients of clause (d)

of

s. 14(1) of the Act so as to entitle him to evict the members of the family of

the main tenant. It could not be said that when the appellant migrated to

Canada, he bad severed all his connections with his mother so that she became

an absolute stranger to the family.

Such an interpretation is against our

national heritage and could never have been contemplated by the Act.

(680 B; 675 B]

·.i.._:.

-~ CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Civil Appeal No. 1533 of

1980.

From the Judgment and Order dated the 20th February, 1980

of the High Court of Delhi at New Delhi in S.A.O. 149 of 1979.

SJ(. Meh,ta for the Appellant.

Yogeshwar Prasad, Ravinder Bana and Mrs. Rani Chhabra for

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the Respondent. H

The Judgment of the Court

was delivered by

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672

SUPREME COURT REPORTS .

FAZAL ALI, J. This appeal by special leave is directed against

a judgment dated February 20, 1980 · of the Delhi' High Court

decreeing the landlord's suit for ejectment of the tenant.

The facts giving rise to the present litigation are summarised

in the judgments

of the Rent Controller and the High Court and

need not be .repeated.

Shorn of details, the positi9n seems to be that Baldev Singh

took the premises on rent on May 12, 1961 at a monthly rental of

Rs. 95/-. At the time when the tenancy started, the tenant was

living in the tenanted house with his father, mother, two sisters

and

a brother. The tenant himself was at that time a bachelor but

seems to have married subsequently.

One of his sisters was married

in this very house.

As it happened,

in 1971 the tenant went to Canada followed

by his wife and children.

It is alleged that after having gone to

Canada, the husband alongwith his wife

took up some employment

there. Admittedly, the tenant did not return to India after 1971.

While leaving for Canada the tenant had left his mother

and

brother in the house who were regularly paying rent to the landlord.

There

is some controversy as to whether or not the mother and.

brother, who were left behind, were being supported

by the tenant

or were living on their own earnings or by the income of the

pro­

perty left by the tenant in India. Such a controversy however, is

of no consequence in deciding the question of law which arises for

consideration in this case.

On September 27, 1972 the landlord filed an application for

t

ejectment of the tenant on the ground of bona fide requirement and -

non-residence

of the tenant under clauses (d) and (e) of sub-section

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(!)of section 14 of the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 (hereinafter .._~

referred to as the 'Act'). The fundamental plea taken by the land-

lord was that with the exit

of the tenant from the house it became

vacant and his mother

and brother who were left behind could not

be treated as members of the family. Hence, in the eye oflaw the

tenanted premises must be deemed

to have fallen vacant.

The suii was resisted

by the mother, brother and sister of the

tenant who averred that even

if

th"e tenant alongwith his wife and

children had shifted to Canada, the non-applicants were continuing

to live in the tem1nted premises an4 as they had been paying reQt

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-B.S. BANGIA v. R.C. BHASIN (Fazal Ali, J.) 673

to the landlord regularly, who h~d been accepting the

question

or the tenancy becoming vacant arose.

same, no

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• ThUi, .the entire case hinges.on the . interpretation of the word

',! .. , II 'family' as also clausesJd) and (e) of s. 14(1) of the Act. So far as

· -.!1if clause (e) js conc~rned, .both the courts below found as a fact that

the landlord

was not able to prove his bona fide necessity.

There­

fore, as far as ground (e) is concerned, the same no longer survives

in view of.the findings of fact recorded by the courts below. The

only questionthatremains to

be considered

is whether the landlord

- ,,.,.,,--can bring.his case for evictfon within the ambit of clause'(d) of

_..----s. 14(1) which may J>e extracted thus:

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"14 (I) Notwithstanding anything to the contrary con­

tained in any other law. or contract, no order or decree for

the. recovery of possession of any premises 'shall be made

by any court or Controller in favour of the. landlord against

a

tenant:

·

Provided that the Controller may, on an application

made to him in the prescribed manner, make an order for

the recovery iJf possessi.on of the premises on one or more

of the following grounds only, namely :

xx xx xx

, (d) that the premises were. let .for use as a residence

and neither thll' tenant nor any member or bis family bas

been residing therein for a period

of six months

imqiediately

before the date of the filing of the ·application for the re­

covery of possession thereof; ·

A close analysis of this provision would reveal that before the

landlord can succeed,

be must prove three essential ingredients-

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(l) that the premises were let out for use as a residence,

{2) that the tenant after ·having taken the premises has

teased to reside, and

"

(3) that apllrt from the tenant no member of his family

also bas been residing for a period of six months

immediately berOre the d3te Qf the filing of the

application for ejectment.

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674 SUPREME COURT REPOllTB (!982) 3 S.C.R.

It is manifest that unless the aforesaid conditions are satisfied

the landlord cannot succeed in getting a decree for ejeetment. 19,

the instant case, while it is the admitted case of the parties that the

tenant had shifted to Canada alongwith bis

wife and children, yet

he had

left Ws mother, brother and ~ister in the house, hence the

second essential condition of clause (d) continues to apply with

full force.

The learned counsel for the appellant, however, submitted

that the mother, brother and sister were undoubtedly living with

the tenant And so long as they ·continued to reside in the tenanted

premises, there could be no question

of the premises falling vacant.

To this, the counsel for the landlord coun iered that neither the

mother, nor the brother

nor the sister could in law

be treated as . .

members of the family of the tenant after be had himself shifted to

a country outside India. Even though while be

was

I iving in Delhi,

he

was in Government service. Thus, it was argued that in the eye

of law, the )o-calledjfamily members would lose their status as

members

of the family of the tenant and would be pure trespassers

or licensees or 'squatters .

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While the suit of the landlord .was dismissed by th-e Rent

Controller, the Rent Control Tribunal allowed the appeal and

directed eviction

of

the family members of the tenant under clause

(d) of s. 14(1) of the Act. The family members of the tenant then

went up

in appeal to the High Court which also affirmed the

find­

ings of the Tribunal and upheld the order of eviction passed by it.

The High Court was also

of the view that after the exit of the main . tenant from India to Canada, neither the mother, nor the brother,

nor the sister could be legally termed as a

membe.r of the family of

,

the tenant.

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• W.e have heard counsel for the parties and given our anxious

consideration to all aspects of the matter and we feel that the High

Court has taken a palpably wrong

view of the law

il)·regard to the

interpretation

of the term 'member of

Cthe family' as used in clause

(d) of s. 14(1) lof the Act.· In coming to its deci.sion, the High

Court

seems to have completely overlooked the dominant purpose

and the main object

of the Act which affords several intrinsic and

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extrinsic evidence to show that tlie non-applicants were undoubtedly

members

of the family

residing· in the house and the migration of

the main tenant to.Canada, would make no·· difference. The word

'family' has

been defined in various

lesaI 9iction.aries and several .

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B.S. BANGIA v. R.C. BHASIN (Fazal Ali, J.) 61S

authorities-of various courts and no court has ever held that mother

or a brother or a sister who is living with the older member of the

family would not constitute a family

of the said member.

Surely, it

cannot be said by any stretch of imagination. that when the tenant

was living with his own mother· in the house and after he migrated

to Cafladit, he had severed all his connections with his -mother so

that she became

an absolute stranger to the family.

Such an inter­

pretation is a~ainst . our national heritage and, as we shall show,

could never have been contemplated by the Act which has manifested

its intention

by virtue of a later amendment.

Coming

now to [the definitions, we find that in Word~ and

Phrases (permanent Edition-volume

16) at pp. 303-311 the word

'family'

b.as been defined thus :

"The father, the mother, and the children ordinarily

constitute a "family".

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"The word "family" embraces more than a hu~band D ·

and wife and includes _children."

"A "family" constitutes all· who live in one house

under one head."

"Father and mother of two illegitimate children; and·

children themselves, all living together under one· roof,

constituted a "family."

(pp. 303-304)

"The word "family" . fa . statute authorizing use of

incQme for support of ward and "family" is not restricted

to those individuals to .whom ward

owes a

legal·duty of

support, but is an expression of great flexibility and is

liberally construed, and includes brothers and sisters in ·

poor financial circumstances for whom the insane ward, if

comp~tent, would make provision."

(p. 311)

"The general or ordinarily accepted meaning of the

word "family", as used in Compensation Act, means a

group, comprising immediate kindred, consisting of the

parents llllQ !b~ir children,· wheth~r q~tually living together

or not:'

(p. 343)

·(Emphasis ours)

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676 SUPRBMB COURT RBPORTS (1982) 3 s.c.R.

Similarly, in Webster's Third New International Dictfonary,

the word 'family'

is defined thus :

"Family-household including not only the servants

but also the head

of the

hous,ehold and. all persom in it

related to him by blood or marriage ...... a group of persons

of common ancestry.''

(p. 821)

(Emphasis supplied)

In Chambers Twentieth Century Dictionary (New. Edition

1972), the word 'Family' has been de'fined thus.;

"family-the household, or all those who . live i.n one

house

(as parents,

children, servants) : parents and their +

children)"··

.In Concise Oxford Dictionary (Sixth Edition), the ·same

D definition appears to have been ·given of the word 'family" which

may be extracted thus :

"family-Members of a household, parents, children,

servants, etc. set

of parents and children, or of relations,

living together or not; persons children.

All descendants

E of common

ancestor."

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A conspectus of the connotation of the term 'family' which

emerges from a reference to the aforesaid dictionaries clearly

shows

that the word 'family' has to

lie given not a restricted but a wider

. meaning so as to include not only the head of the family but all .•

~embers or descendants from the common ancestors who are -

actuallyliving with the same head. More particularly, in our

country, blood relations do not evaporate merely because a member

of the famiiy-the father, the brother or the son-leaves his house-

hold and

goes out for some time. Furthermore, in

our opinion,

the legislal!lre has advis~dly used the term that any mem_ber of the

family residing therein for a period.

of six months immediately before the date of the filing· of the action would be treated as a·

tenant. The stress is not so much on the 11ctual presence of the

tenant as

on the

fact that the members" of the family actually live'

and reside in the tenanted premises.

In fact, it seems to us that

clause

(d) of s. 14(1) of the Act is a special concession given to the

landlord to obtain possession only where the tenanted premises have

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ii.§. liANGlA v. il.c. BHASJN (Paza/ Aii, J.) 67;

· been completely vacated by th( tenant ·if he/ceased to exercise any

control over the property

either through himself or through his

blood relations.

In fact, a controversy arose

as to what would happen to the

members

.of thtl' family of the tenant if while residing in the premises

1 be dies and in order to resolve this anomaly the legislature fl!!me­

' · diately stepped in to amend certain provisions of. the Act and

J defined the actual connotation of the term ·'members of the family' .

. By virtue of Act I 8 of 1916 t])e definition of "Tenant" was inserted

so as to include various categories of persons. S.ub-clause · (iii) of

clause (i) of section 2 of the Act actually mentions the persons who

could be regarded as tenant

even if main tenant dies. This

sub­

clause may be extracted thus :

"(I) "tenant" means any person . by w~om or on

whose accQunt or behalf the rent of any premises is, or •. but

for a speciliI contract, wcluld be, payable and includes-

. .

(i) a sub-tenant;

(ii) any person continuing in possession after the termi­

natibn of his tenancy; and··

(iii) in the event of the death of the person. continuing in .

possession after the termination

of his tenancy, subject

to the

order· of succession and conditions specified,

respectiyely, in Explanation I and Explanation II to.

this clause such

of the aforesaid person's-.

(a) spouse,

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(b) son or daughter or, where there are' both son and ·

daughter, both of them,

(c) parents,

(d) daughter-in-law, being the widow· of his pre-

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deceased son, G

as had been ordinarily living in the premises with such

person

as a member or members of his family up to

the date

of .his death, but does

noHnclude, ......... "

. It would appear that parents were expressly included in sub~

clause (iii). It bas also been provided that apart from the heirs

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SbPilEMli C<ibit RB!'OllTS (198~11 s.c.k.

specified in clauses (a) to (d) (extracted above), ~Ven those persons

who had been ordinarily Jiving in the premises with the tenant

would

be treated as members of the family. The

statemen~. of

objtcts arid reasons for this amendment may J>e extracted thus :

"There has been a persistent demand for amendments

to the Delhi Rent Control

Act, 1958

with a view to COD·

ferring a right of tenancy on certain heirs/successors of a

deceased statutory tenant

so that they may be protected

from eviction by

lan-dlords and also for simplifying the

procedure for eviction of

tenants. in case the landlord

re·

quires the premises bona fide for his personal occupation.

Further, Government decided.on the 9th September,

1975

that a person who

own$ his own house in his place of work

should vacate the Government accommodation allotted to

him before the 31st December, 1975. Government .con·

sidered that in the ·circumstances, the Act required to be

amended urgently." . ,

If this was the intention of the legislature then clause (d) of

section 14( 1) of the Act could not be interpreted in a manner so as

to defeat the very object of the Act. It is well setth:d that a bene·

· ficial provision must 'be· meaningfully construed so as to advance

the object

of the Act, and curing any lacuna or defect

appearing in

the

same. There are abundant authorities to show that the term "Family" must always be liberally and broadly construed so as to

include near relations of the head of the family.

In Hira Lal & Ors. v. Banarsi Dass(') even the learned Judge

who decided that case had observed at page

472 that the term "members of the family" on the facts and circumstances of the case

should not

be given a narrow construction.

ln·Gobind Dass & Ors. vs. Ku/dip Singh(') a Division Bench

of Delhi High Court consisting of H.R. Khanna,, C.J .. (as be then

was) and Prakash Narain, J. while recognising , the necessity of

giving a wide interpretation to the word "family" observed as

follows :

"I hold that in the section now under consideration· the

word .. family" includes bf others and sister~ of the· deceased

(I) 1979 (I) R.L.R. 46~.

<1) AIR 1971 Delhi IS\.

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living with her at the time of her death. I think that that

meaning

is required by the ordinary acceptation of the · word in this connection and that the legislature has used

the wo~d "family" to introduce a flexible and wide term."

In Mr8. G. V. Shukla v. Shri Prabhu Ram Sukhram Dass -

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) Mahajan, J. (as he then was) observed as follows: B

"Therefore, it must be held that" the word 'family' is . .

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capable of wider interpretation, but that interpretation

must have relation to the existing facts and circumstances

proved on the record in each case."

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liven as far back as 1930, Wright, J. in· Price v. Gould &

Ors(') (a King's Bench decision) had clearly held that the. word

"family" included brothers and sisters and in this connection

observed as follows :

"I find as a fact that· the brothers and sisters were D

residing with the deceased at the time of her death ..... ..

It has been laid· down tb.at the primary meaning of the

word "family" is children, hut that primary meaning is

clearly susceptible

of wider interpretation, because the

cases decide

that the exact scope of the word must depend

on the

·context and the other provisions of the will or deed E

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in view of the surrounding circumstances."

"Thus, in Snow v. Teed (1870, 23 L.T. Rep. 303; L. Rep. 9

Bq. 622) it was held that the word "family" could be ex­

tended beyond not merely children but even beyond the

statutory next

of

kin."

Jn view, however, of the very clear 'and plain. language of

+ clause (d) of section 14(1) of the Act itself, we do not want to

burden this judgment

by multiplying authorities.

On a point of fact, we might mention that €he Rent Con­

troller had given a clear finding that t~e mother, younger brother

·, · (Davinder .. Kumar Bangia) and sister (Vijay Lakshmi) were

undoubtedly residing in the disputed premises alongwith the main

(1) 1963 P.L.R. (vol. LXV) 256.

(2)

1930 (vol. 143) Law Times 333.

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SUPREME COURT REPORTS I 198~1 j s.c.k

tenant and continued to reside there even on the date ·when the

·action for ejectment

was brought.

In these circumstances, we are

sati~fied that the view taken by

the High Court is legally erroneous and cannot be supported. The

landlord has miserably failed· to prove· the essential ingredients of

B · clause (d) of section 14(1) of the Act so as· to entitle him to evict

the members of the family of the main tenant.

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We therefore, allow this appeal, set aside the judgment and

order of the High Court and dismiss the plaintiff's ;action for eject­

ment and restore the judgment of the Rent Controller. In the

peculiar circumstances

of the case, there will be no order as to cost.

H.L.C . Appeal allowed.

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