Special Leave Petition Civil No 7883 of 1985
From the Judgment and Order dated 2451985 of the Bombay High Court in Appeal No 461 of 1985
MC Bhandare GS Chatterjee and Ms CK Sucharita for the Petitioners
B Datta G Ramaswamy Additional Solicitor Generals AS Bhasme Praveen Kumar RP Srivastava Mrs Sushma Suri UJ Makhija BS Bhasania Mrs AK Verma and Turn Bangs for the Respondents
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by KANIA J
Heard Counsel
This is a Petition under Article 136 of the Constitution for special leave to appeal against a judgment and order of a Division Bench of the Bombay High Court dated May 24 1985
Original Petitioner No 1 who is dead was a hutment dweller and Petitioner No 2 is a Union representing hutment dwellers having their hutments in lands belonging to the Bombay Port Trust
Respondents Nos 1 to 3 to the petition are the Chairman of the Bombay Port Trust Union of India and the State of Maharashtra respectively
Some of the hutments in the Bombay Port Trust lands were cleared by the Bombay Port Trust in the first part of May 1985 and these hutments were demolished
The Petitioners filed a Writ Petition No 992 of 1985 on the Original Side of the Bombay High Court inter alia for restraining the Bombay Port Trust from carrying out any further demolition of hutments and asking for several other reliefs
A learned Single Judge of the Bombay High Court in his judgment and order dated May 15 1985 disposing of the petition pointed out that the Petitioners  Counsel was unable to point out any legal 176 fight in the petitioners
The property admittedly belongs to the Bombay Port Trust and the provisions of the Bombay Rents Hotels and Lodging House Rates Control Act 1947 are not applicable to the said property
The learned Judge further pointed out that although the petitioners claimed that there was some policy of the State Government for providing alternative accommodation before the hutments on public lands were demolished no statement of any such policy was brought to the attention of the Court and the learned Counsel for the State denied that there was any such policy for the Bombay Port Trust lands
The learned Judge dismissed the writ petition but directed that status quo should be maintained till and inclusive of 30th May 1985 on certain conditions
The Petitioners preferred an appeal against the said order which was dismissed by a Division Bench of the Bombay High Court by the order sought to be impugned before us
Certain interim orders were passed in the said Petition from time to time with which we are not concerned
By an order dated January 27 1986 a Division Bench of this Court comprising Bhagwati CJ and Oza J observed that as far as they gathered about 406 families were involved in the operation relating to the removal of unauthorised hutments on the lands of Bombay Port Trust
They also observed that it was fair and just that some alternative land sites be provided to those who have been continuously in occupation since at least two years prior to a cut off date fixed by them as January 1 1981 should be provided with alternative sites before being thrown out of the said land and directed that those hutment dwellers who have been in occupation of the Bombay Port Trust lands along with their families for the said period shall not be thrown out unless and until as a condition precedent alternative sites are provided to them for occupation
The Division Bench appointed a Commis sion for the purposes of inquiring and determining as to which of the persons whose names and addresses were given in the affidavit filed on behalf of the petitioners were in occupation of hutments in the Bombay Port Trust lands for at least two years prior to January 1 1981
A plain reading of the said order makes it clear that the State Government was directed to provide alternative sites only to those hutment dwellers who were ultimately found entitled to protection as being in occupation for the period set out earlier ie two years prior to the cut off date
The Commission appointed by this Court submitted its Report on November 4 1986
The Commission pointed out that out of 411 families mentioned in the affidavit filed on behalf of the Petitioners the Com mission could make an inquiry in regard to 302 hutment 177 dwellers
59 of them had already left for Govandi a place in Bombay where alternative sites were presumably allotted to them and the Commission held that these persons were not staying on the Bombay Port Trust lands
The Report makes it clear that inquiry could not be made with certain persons mentioned in the affidavit as they were not available for inquiry despite the fact that the Commission visited the sites at least six times and spent considerable time there
Out of the persons concerned the Commission found that on the evidence only 50 hutment dwellers with their families could satisfy the Commission that they were living on the site for a period of two years prior to the cut off date namely 111981
The other hutment dwellers were unable to satisfy the Commission with their evidence
The commission er however stated that it was possible that some of these persons who had been unable to establish their residence for the aforesaid period might have been unable to do so because of their poverty lack of literacy and want of documentary proof
It is after that making of this Report that the matter has come up before us
As far as we can see in view of the aforesaid order of this Court the main task before us is to implement that order
It was contended by Mr Bhandare learned Counsel for the Petitioners that although the cut off date was fixed as 111981 we should extended the cut off date in view of the time which has gone by
He further contended that there was a policy of the State of Maharashtra not to evict unautho rised occupants on the public lands except after providing them alternative accommodation
We are unable to accept the submissions of Mr Bhandare
Once the cut off date has been fixed by this Court by the aforesaid order there is no basis for extending the cut off date merely because time has gone by since that order because that would render the entire task given to the Commission futile
Moreover doing so would run counter to the intention of this Court in making the aforesaid order which was to protect only those hutment dwellers who had been in occupation for at least two years prior to 111981
Although the policy of the Govern ment of the State of Maharashtra was referred to no policy statement was pointed out to us and the learned Counsel for the State of Maharashtra made it clear that no such policy would be applicable to the Bombay Port Trust lands
In view of this we are unable to take into account any alleged policy of the State
Moreover the Port Trust land cannot be regarded as public land as being in the occupation of the Government either the Central Government or the State Government
Under the circumstances we direct that the said 50 hutment 178 dwellers along with their families who had been identified by the Commission as having occupied the said hutments for two years or more prior to the cut off date namely 111981 shall not be removed from their hutments and their hutments shall not be demolished except after provision of alternative sites for them
As already directed by the earlier order the duty of carrying out this task is imposed on the State of Maharashtra but even if either the Central Government or the Port Trust is able to give alternative sites to these hutment dwellers the Port Trust will be at liberty to remove these hutments
We realise that the problem of hutment dwellers is a human problem and the removal of hutments is bound to cause an untold hardship and misery to the occupants
However on that consideration we cannot prevent Bombay Port Trust from putting its land to its own use
It is not possible for this Court to say that whether there would be a greater injury to public interest by the removal of the unauthorised hutment dwellers or by preventing the Port Trust from put ting its own land to a proper use
In order to obviate the hardship referred to earlier although to a limited extent we direct that even the hutments on the said lands which are not entitled to protection will not be demolished for a period of six months from the date of signing of this order
We only hope and trust that it will be possible for the State Government or the Central Government or even the Bombay Port Trust to make some provision for providing alternative sites at least to some of these hutment dwell ers if not all
However we make it clear that the provi sion of such alternative sites is not made a condition precedent to the removal of the hutment dwellers or the hutments in question other than those who are entitled to protection on the basis set out earlier
The Special Leave Petition is disposed of by this order
There will be no order as to costs
TNA Petition disposed of


Summary:
The appellanttenant took on lease a building from the respondent
In the Deed of Rent there was an express provi sion that the tenant should not sublet the premises to anyone
However shortly thereafter a social club came to be opened in the premises where members played cards chess etc
every evening till about midnight
The respondent thereupon filed
a suit against the tenant seeking his eviction inter alia on the ground of sub letting the prem ises contrary to the terms of the lease deed
The tenant admitted the factum of the opening of the club but contended that he had neither sublet the premises for rent nor other wise parted with its possession to the club
The Trial Court held that the respondent had failed to prove that the appellant had sublet the premises to the Club for rent and that the evidence only warranted an inference that the appellant had allowed the club to use the premises as a licencee and as such the appellant was not liable to be evicted
The Appellate Court held that the evidence did not establish any subletting of the premises for rent but nevertheless there were adequate materials to hold that the appellant had parted with the possession of the premises in favour of the club and such parting of possession would amount to subletting within the meaning of section 131e of the Rajasthan Premises Control of Rent  Eviction Act 1950 and as such the appellant was liable to be evicted
Consequently the Appellate Court passed a decree for evic tion
The High Court dismissed the second appeal of the appellant
After the filing of the appeal in this Court the re spondent filed a civil miscellaneous petition seeking per mission to produce certain documents in the nature of the Auditor s reports and the Managing Committee s reports of the club as additional evidence to establish that 185 there existed a stipulation for the payment of rent by the club to the appellant and the club was bound to pay rent to the appellant for the user of the premises but such payment was being deferred in view of the pendency of the eviction suit between the respondent and the appellant
Dismissing the appeal and the civil miscellaneous peti tion the Court HELD 1 On a reading of sub clause e of Section 131 it is seen that a tenant will render himself liable for eviction if he has assigned sublet or otherwise parted with the possession of the whole or any part of the prem ises without the permission of landlord
 Consequently even if a tenant parts with possession of the whole or any part of the premises without assigning or subletting the prem ises he would still be liable to be evicted from the prem ises under the Act
If from this perspective the user of the premises by the club is examined it can certainly be held that the appellant had parted with the possession of the premises as envisaged in clause e of sub section 1 of section 13
188E G 2 There is no evidence to show that the appellant had at any time exercised his right to exclusive possession and kept the premises locked and denied the members of the club entry to the premises
188H 189A 3 Section 146 of the Companies Act enjoins every company to have a registered office and certain requirements of the Companies Act have to be complied with by the club by virtue of its registered office being situated in the leased premises
The appellant cannot prevent the club from per forming its statutory duties so long as the club has its registered office in the premises
189B D Smt
Rajbir Kaur vs Ms section Chokesiri  Co JT 19883 SC 593 distinguished
4 The additional documents could have been obtained and filed before the Trial Court the Appellate Court or the High Court and no satisfactory explanation has been offered for having failed to do so
Hence there is no justification to allow the civil miscellaneous petition
191 C