Mahesh Grover, J.@mdashThis order will dispose of all the aforesaid eight revision petitions directed by the petitioners who are tenants in the premises which were sought to be vacated by the respondent-landlord Bank by filing petitions under Section 13 of the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949 on the following grounds:
i) Arrears of rent; and
ii) Personal need of the landlord.
It was averred in the rent petitions that the premises are required for the staff/employees and for better transaction of business due to increase in the number of employees and business. It was also pleaded that expansion is required to post new officers etc.
2. In so far as the ground for non-payment of rent was concerned, it was rendered redundant on account of its satisfaction leaving the learned Rent Controller to examine the issue of personal necessity raised by the landlord-respondent.
3. The learned Rent Controller concluded the need to be unfounded and dismissed the petitions, but in appeal the Appellate Authority reversed the findings and ordered the eviction of the petitioners which is now a cause of grievance to them.
4. Learned counsel for the petitioners contends that the Appellate Authority has gone wrong in holding the need to be genuine whereas there was evidence to suggest that the actual staff strength of the bank has been reduced. He thus contends that the findings of the Appellate Authority are totally contrary to the evidence on record. It has also been stated by the petitioners that the need expressed by the respondent-Bank totally belies the material evidence in the shape of the strength of the employees of the Bank and the expansion so pleaded is without any foundational basis.
5. The respondent-Bank has opposed the prayer of the petitioners by asserting that the need of the landlord is genuine and the expansion has been withheld and delayed on account of the pendency of the petitions.
6. I have heard the learned counsel for the parties and have duly considered the material on record.
7. If the rent petitions are to be seen, they clearly depict the desire of the landlord to expand its business keeping in view the nature of activities undertaken by it. The petitioners, who are tenants, cannot dictate that such expansion of a financial institution is not founded on a bona fide assessment. Organisations like the bank etc. have their own decision making process and if they desire that a certain course has to be adopted to expand business and improve its transactions then they are very well within their right to assert so and the tenant cannot question such a decision. This is a settled law as has been established by various authoritative pronouncements of the Hon''ble Supreme Court extracted here below:
8. In
"14. The crux of the ground envisaged in clause (e) of Section 14(1) of the Act is that the requirement of the landlord for occupation of the tenanted premises must be bona fide. When a landlord asserts that he requires his building for his own occupation the Rent Controller shall not proceed on the presumption that the requirement is not bona fide. When other conditions of the clause are satisfied and when the landlord shows a prima facie case it is open to the Rent Controller to draw a presumption that the requirement of the landlord is bona fide. It is often said by courts that it is not for the tenant to dictate terms of the landlord as to how else he can adjust himself without getting possession of the tenanted premises. While deciding the question of bona fides of the requirement of the landlord it is quite unnecessary to make an endeavour as to how else the landlord could have adjusted himself."
9. Similarly, in
"The landlord is the best judge of his residential requirements. He has a complete freedom in the matter. It is no concern of the courts to dictate to the landlord how, and in what manner, he should live or to prescribe for him a residential standard of their own".
10. For the aforesaid reasons, I do not find any infirmity in the findings recorded by the learned Appellate Authority holding that the Bank was within its right to get the premises vacated in order to expand its business and housing its staff and offering better facilities to its customers. There is ample evidence on record to show the expanding nature of business of the Bank and even if such a material would not have been there, then also if the Bank felt that it needed the premises to modernise its functioning, it was certainly within its right to do so. The petitions are, therefore, held to be without any merit and are dismissed.
