ivil Appeal No 3812 of 1989
From the Judgment and Order dated 1289 of the Andhra Pradesh High Court in Revision Petition No 302 of 1989
KN Bhatt MJ Paul and Kailash Vasdev for the Appellant
A Subba Rao for the Respondents
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by AHMADI J
Special leave granted
This tenant s appeal raises the question whether a tenant who omits to pay or tender the rent in respect of the demised premises under the belief that he had a right to purchase the property under a prior agreement to sell and was therefore not obliged to pay the rent can be said to be a wilful defaulter within the meaning of the proviso to sub section 2 of Section 10 of the AP Buildings Lease Rent  Eviction Control Act 1960 hereinafter called the Act 
Section 101 lays down that a tenant shall not be evicted except in accordance with the provisions of this section or sections 12 and 13 of the Act
Clause i of sub section 2 of that section next provides that a land lord who seeks to evict his tenant may apply to the Control ler for a direction in that behalf and the Controller on being satisfied that the tenant has not tendered the rent due by him within fifteen days after the expiry of the time fixed in the agreement of tenancy or in the absence of any such agreement by the last day of the month next following that for which the rent is due shall make an order direct ing the tenant to put the landlord in possession
This is however subject to the proviso which reads under Provided that in any case falling under clause i if the Controller is satisfied that the tenant s default to pay or tender rent was not wilful he may notwithstanding anything in section 11 give the tenant a reasonable time not exceeding fifteen days to pay or tender the rent due by him to the landlord upto the date of such payment or tender and 118 on such payment or tender the application shall be rejected
 The proviso therefore makes it clear that if the Control ler is satisfied that the tenant s default is not wilful he may give the tenant an opportunity to pay or tender the rent due by him to the landlord and on such payment or tender being made within the time allowed the landlord s applica tion for eviction shall be rejected
The benefit of this proviso is available to only those tenant who are not guilty of wilful default
In the present case the courts below have come to the conclusion that the tenant s default was wilful and hence the benefit of the proviso was not avail able to him
The question then is whether this conclusion reached by the courts below can be sustained on he facts found proved
The facts lie in a narrow compass
The respondents purchased the demised premises by a registered sale deed dated 7th December 1977 for Rs70000
The appellant was in actual possession of a part of the premises as a tenant of the vendors at the date of purchase
After the purchase of the property the respondents served the appellant with a notice dated 13th December 1977 calling upon him to pay the rent due and deliver vacant possession of the demised prem ises
The appellant replied to the notice on 29th December 1977 alleging that the vendors had orally agreed on 14th October 1977 to sell the property to him for Rs70000 and had received Rs5000 as earnest
The appellant therefore contended that he was under no obligation to pay the rent and vacate the premises since he was ready and willing to purchase the property
The respondents sent a reply denying the existence of any such oral agreement and filed a suit for eviction
It may here be mentioned that on the date of the purchase of the property the rent was paid to the ven dors up to the end of November 1977
The respondents there fore claimed the rent from December 1977 to May 1978 from the appellant
Since the appellant failed to pay the rent for the said period the courts below came to the conclusion that he was a wilful defaulter and passed a decree in eject ment against him
The tenant has therefore come in appeal to this Court
The short question then is whether it can be said that the tenant s default to pay or tender rent from December 1977 to May 1978 was not wilful to avail of the benefit of the proviso extracted above
It may be noticed that in cases where the tenant has defaulted to pay or tender the rent he is entitled to an opportunity to pay or tender the same if his default is not wilful
The proviso is couched in nega tive form to reduce 119 the rigour of the substantive provision in Section 102 of the Act
An Act is said to be wilful if it is intentional conscious and deliberate
The expressions wilful  and wilful default  came up for consideration before this Court in section Sundaram Pillai etc
VR Pattabiraman etc 1985 2 SCR 643
After extracting the meaning of these expressions from different dictionaries See pp 659  660 this Court concluded at p 661 as under Thus a consensus of the meaning of the words wilful default  appears to indicate that default in order to be wilful must be inten tional deliberate calculated and conscious with full knowledge of legal consequences flowing therefrom
Since the proviso with which we are concerned is couched in negative form the tenant can prevent the decree by satisfy ing the Controller that his omission to pay or tender the rent was not wilful
If the Controller is so satisfied he must give an opportunity to the tenant to make good the arrears within a reasonable time and if the tenant does so within the time prescribed he must reject the landlords application for eviction
In the present case it is not in dispute that the tenant did not pay the rent from December 1977 to May 1978 before the institution of the suit
Under the eviction notice served on him in December 1977 he was called upon to pay the rent from December 1977 only
The appellant tenant did not pay or tender the rent from Decem ber 1977 to May 1978 not because he had no desire to pay the rent to the respondents but because the bona fide believed that he was entitled to purchase the property under the oral agreement of 14th October 1977
He had also paid Rs5000 by way of earnest under the said oral agreement
True it is his suit for specific performance of the said oral agreement has since been dismissed but he has filed an appeal which is pending
He therefore bona fide believed that he was entitled to purchase the property under the said oral agree ment and since he had already paid Rs5000 by way of ear nest thereunder he was under no obligation to pay the rent to the respondents
In order to secure eviction for non payment of rent it must be shown that the default was intentional deliberate calculated and conscious with full knowledge of its consequences
Here is a tenant who felt that even though he had invested Rs5000 as earnest the vendor has sold the property to the respondents in total disregard of his right to purchase the same
This is not a case of a tenant who has failed to pay the rent without any rhyme or reason
He was not averse to paying the rent but he genuinely believed that he was under no obligation to do so as he had a prior 120 right to purchase the property
We are therefore of the opinion that this is a case in which the Controller should have invoked the proviso and called upon the appellant to pay the arrears from December 1977 to May 1978 within a certain time
Failure to do so has resulted in miscarriage of justice
We are therefore of the opinion that the ejectment decree cannot be allowed to stand
In the result we allow this appeal and set aside the eviction decree
The matter will go back to the Controller with a direction that he will give the benefit of the provi so extracted above to the appellant in accordance with law
Parties will bear their own costs
NVK Appeal allowed


Summary:
The appellant company had chartered their vessel to the respondent for carrying oil from Arabian Gulf to India under a charter party
Disputes and differences arose between the parties and the matter was referred to a single arbitrator in London as stipulated in the charter party
The arbitra tor awarded a certain sum to be paid by the respondent to the appellant with interest
The arbitrator further awarded to the appellant the costs of the reference which were to be taxed in the event of disagreement
The respondent paid only the principal sum and failed and neglected to pay interest the appellant s cost of reference to arbitration and the cost of the award
The appellant filed an applica tion under the Foreign Awards Recognition  Enforcement Act 1961 in the High Court of Bombay
The learned Single Judge of the High Court directed the respondent to pay interest and costs of the award so awarded by the arbitrator and also cost of the petition
The learned Judge however rejected the appellant s prayer for the cost of reference to arbitration and also rejected the applicant s prayer that in the alternative liberty should be reserved in re spect of the said prayer
The appellant preferred an appeal before the Division Bench
During the pendency of this appeal the appellant s costs of reference to arbitration as awarded by the arbitrator were taxed and a taxation certifi cate was produced at the time of hearing of the appeal
The Division Bench held that at the time when the petition was filed there had been no agreement upon or reference for taxing
of such costs it appeared that the application to have the costs taxed was made only after the appeal was filed and as such no order could be made directing the respondent to make payment to the appellant of the costs so taxed
Before this Court it was urged on behalf of the respond ent that there was no scope for addition to the award and the award had to be executed as it was and the costs of reference had not been awarded
71 Allowing the appeal this Court HELD 1 Foreign awards as it manifests are executa ble in this country under the provisions of the Foreign Awards Recognition  Enforcement Act 1961
The Act was passed to give effect to the convention on the recognition and enforcement of foreign arbitrator s award
74F 2 It is obvious that since the Act was calculated and designed to subserve the cause of facilitating international trade and promotion thereof by providing for speedy settle ment of disputes arising in such trade through arbitration any expression or phrase occurring therein should receive consistent with its literal and grammatical sense a liberal construction
75B Renusagar Power Co Ltd vs General Electric Co  Anr   referred to
3 The Court agrees that the award must be executed as it is and there is no scope for any addition to any award
But the award to be executed must be properly construed and given effect to
If the award is ambiguous the court has jurisdiction to determine what it means
75C 4 In the instant case the award is not ambiguous
The award read properly means so far as costs of the refer ence are concerned that it was an award upon certain condi tions ie the award stipulated that the costs of reference will be paid
The costs of such reference were however directed to be determined either by agreement between the parties and in case there was no agreement or disagreement to be taxed
75E 5 Law justice and equity in the facts and the circum stances of this case enjoin that the appellant should have such costs
The appellant has taken all possible steps that could be taken in the situation contemplated by the award
The appellant has written for agreement about the costs of reference
The respondent did not agree
The appellant took steps to have the costs taxed in London and the costs have been taxed
75H 76A 6 There is no evidence of the delay or laches on the part of the appellant as such which would disentitle the appellant to such costs
75F 72 7 Under the Act if an application is filed for decree in terms of the award
the court in upholding the award ought to grant a decree in terms of the award and not sub stract any portion thereof
Since the award directed costs of appellant s reference to be paid as is mutually agreed upon or as taxed the Division Bench ought to have passed an order for costs as taxed
76H 77A