THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE VILAS V.AFZALPURKAR CIVIL REVISION PETITION No. 2959 of 2005. ORDER: This revision is at the instance of tenant questioning the concurrent findings of the Courts below ordering eviction of the petitioner on the ground of personal requirement. The respondent herein filed RCC.No. 1 of 1995 before the learned Rent Controller, Mangalagiri against the petitioner on the ground of wilful default in payment of rent for the entire 1994 and for January to March, 1995. The eviction was also sought on the ground that the respondent requires the schedule premises for carrying on his watch repairing shop which is presently being carried on in a Mobile make-shift box in front of a passage abutting to the house of one Konakalla Venkateshwara Rao by the side of the main road. The said eviction petition was resisted by the petitioner by contending that he has not committed any default in payment of rent and the requirement pleaded by the respondent/land-lord his not bona fide. Though the learned Rent Controller upheld the wilful default, the lower appellate court, on appeal by the petitioner, has set aside the said finding. Therefore, this court is only concerned with the eviction orders of the lower appellate Court confirming the order of the Rent Controller on the ground of bona fide personal requirement pleaded by the respondent. The learned Counsel for the petitioner has very strenuously contended that the petitioner could be able to establish by adducing the evidence that the respondent owns several shops and many of them fell vacant before and after the RCC was filed and that the respondent has let them out to different persons and therefore the personal requirement pleaded by the respondent is erroneously believed by both the courts below as bona fide, particularly in view of the fact that the respondent did not occupy the shops which fell vacant before and after filing of the present eviction case. The learned Counsel for the petitioner places reliance on the decisions of the Supreme Court in Sri Balaji Krishna Hardware Stores vs. Srinivasaiah[1] and i n Jyothi Automobiles vs. Khet Bai [2]. The learned Counsel for the petitioner submits that the fact that the several shops belonging to the respondent fell vacant and the respondent not occupying any of them goes to show that the personal requirement of the respondent is not bona fide and therefore the impugned judgment of the lower Appellate Court confirming the eviction of the petitioner on the ground of personal requirement in spite of evidence that several shops fell vacant and the land-lord did not occupy the same, cannot be sustained. Per contra, the learned Counsel for the respondent/land- lord contends that there is absolutely no evidence that any of the shops fell vacant after induction of the petitioner as a tenant. The learned Counsel has placed on record the evidence of PW.1 as well as the evidence of RWs 1 and 2 and has pointed out the relevant portions of their evidence. The cross- examination of Pw.1 on 24.7.1997 reads as under: “There are five shops nearer the schedule property. Damarla Prasada Rao, Veniglla Ramaswamy, Janjanam Lakshmi Narayana, Macherla Nageswara Rao are the tenants. One of the tenants is there from the last 4 years and another from last 6 years, another from 4 years and another from 2 years. The shop where Macherla Nageshwararao is tenant, there were about 4 to 6 tenants earlier to him. In respect of the shop wherein Kanakachari is there, thereby one tenant earlier to him. Except the shop covered under the petition, other shops were vacant for some time…………….Out of 6, 5 shops belonging to me, there are gold shops in 4 sops. The bazaar in which the shops are there is called sharab bazaar. In the said street, except one or two cloth shops, others are gold shops………..After the respondent started his business in my shop, two shops belonging to me were vacated and others have came in and took them on lease. I am intending to commence my business by way of opening a showroom for watches and service.” RW.1 in his Chief Examination stated as under: “There are 4 shops belonging to Pw.1 in the complex where my shop is located. One of the shops one Venigalla Ramaswamy is there. He is there in the said premises even earlier to our taking the shop on lease. In the 2nd shop Janjanam Lakshminarayana and Venbigalla Durgaprasadarao are there. They are the tenants of the said shop till 1994. Earlier to that one Kanakachari was there and he was doing gold business. Earlier to that one Ponnari Vithalrao is there and he was an Artist. In the 3rd shop Maduri Printing Press and they are in the said premises from 1995. Earlier to that one Kali Veeraiah was running Syamiya business. He was there for 6 months and vacated from the premises. Earlier to that the said shop was is a vacant one. In the 4th shop, one Macherla Nageshwararao is there. He is doing gold business. He has been in there in the said shop from 1990 onwards. Earlier to him 4 or 5 people were there on different periods and they were also doing gold business. Each one of them reside therefore period of 3 months each.” Based on the above evidence, it is contended that there is no clear evidence on record that any of the shops belonging to the respondent fell vacant after induction of the petitioner and as such the contention that several shops belonging to the respondent have fallen vacant and therefore the requirement of the respondent is not bona fide is totally incorrect. The learned Counsel also submits in the alternative that even assuming that any of the shops had fallen vacant, the personal requirement pleaded by the respondent for the schedule premises is with reference to its suitability and it is well settled that it is for the land-lord to choose convenience, suitability and sufficiency of accommodation to carry on the business and the tenant cannot dictate the land-lord with regard to suitability, convenience and size. In support of his contention, the learned Counsel for the respondent relied on a decision of the Supreme Court in Boorgu Jagadeshwaraiah vs. Pushpa Trading Company [3]. In addition to the above decision, the learned Counsel for the respondent relied on the evidence of Rw.2, who is the father of the petitioner/tenant, who owns a building right opposite to the schedule premises wherein he along with his son is carrying on business and also residing in the said premises. He deposed in his Cross-examination as under: “Now the ground portion of my house is vacant for the last 1 ½ years. Earlier to that also for the last 6 months I was keeping that portion vacant because of my ill-health. The shop belonging to ours which is kept vacant is bigger than the shop in dispute. It is true that the Municipality people have dismantled a portion of alleged encroachments of our building on the ground floor. Witness volunteers that he has constructed his building on his own site and not encroached. It is not true to say that I have encroached the site and constructed the house.” Relying on the above cross examination of Rw.2, the learned Counsel for the respondent contends that the petitioner/tenant is merely hanging on the premises though his father owns a building just opposite to the schedule premises, which is bigger than the schedule premises. A perusal of the Judgement of the learned Rent Controller goes to show that the learned Rent Controller took into consideration the aspect that the father of the tenant is having terraced building just opposite to petition schedule property and also the decision of the Supreme Court in Boorgu Jagadeshwaraiah’s case (3rd supra) and was of the view that the tenant along with his family members is having a building just opposite to the petition schedule property wherein Rw.2 is carrying on business in the ground floor and the petitioner can easily shift his business to the premises which is available to him and that the bona fide personal requirement of the respondent shows that he is carrying on his business in front of another person’s house abutting the road and the police and municipal authorities are also causing much inconvenience to him for doing business on road margin and observing as above, the Rent Controller upheld the personal requirement. The lower appellate Court after re- appreciating the evidence on record, gave a finding that there is no proper evidence as to what are the shops which were available for the respondent to occupy during the pendency of the present application and as such the decision in Boorgu Jagadeshwaraiah (3rd supra) is not applicable, in the absence of any evidence on record. On the above analysis, it is clear that even if there are several shops are vacant prior to induction of the petitioner as a tenant and in any case as the requirement of the respondent to the schedule premises is pleaded on the basis of its suitability, following the ration in Boorgu Jagadeshwaraiah (3rd supra), I am of the view that the concurrent findings of both the courts below upholding the personal requirement of the respondent cannot be said to be perverse and is not amenable for interference. The said finding together with the finding that right opposite to the petition schedule premises, the petitioner’s family owns a building in which a bigger shop is kept vacant, no hardship would be caused to the petitioner to shift his business and as such I am not persuaded to take a different view than the one taken by the courts below. The revision petition is liable to be dismissed and it is accordingly dismissed. The petitioner/tenant is granted three months time to vacate and handed over the petition schedule premises to the respondent/land-lord. The petitioner shall file an undertaking within two weeks from today before the learned Rent Controller that he would pay all the arrears of rent upto date and shall not create any third party rights or interest over the schedule property and shall hand over peaceful and vacant possession to the respondent, after expiry of three months. There shall be no order as to costs. __________________________ VILAS V. AFZALPURKAR,J 01.04.2010. KRB. THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE VILAS V.AFZALPURKAR CIVIL REVISION PETITION No. 2959 of 2005. Dated: 01.04.2010. [1] AIR 1998 S.C. 994. [2] 2000(1) ALD 627. [3] 1998 (3) ALT 26 (SC).