Case: B.V. Patankar &amp; Others Vs. C.G. Sastry

the House Rent Control Order of 1948 stood repealed must be repelled as unsound and cannot be sustained, because it was an existing law which was saved by Art. 372 of the Constitution and remained unaffected by Art. 254. The Punjab High Court in Tilakram Rambaksh v. Bank of Patiala, AIR 1959 Punj 440 at p. 447 discussing the effect of Part B States (Laws) Act on the application of the Transfer of Property Act to Pepsu said:"All that Central Act III of 1951 has done is to make it possible for Part B States to extend the Act to any part of territory by notification. Actually, however this was never done by Pepsu or Punjab and the Transfer of Property Act is not as such in force there. It is unnecessary in the circumstances to examine the argument further". Although the question of repugnancy was raised in the High Court at the time of the hearing of the appeal, the true effect of S. 3 of the Part B States (Laws) Act was not brought to the notice of the learned Judges nor was the Notification placed before them, but it was discussed by the High Court in its order refusing certificate under Art. 133(1) of the Constitution. The argument of repugnancy, therefore, is wholly inefficacious in this appeal. 8. The in applicability of S. 47 to the proceedings out of which the appeal has arisen was also raised before us, but that contention is equally unsubstantial because the question whether the decree was completely satisfied and therefore the Court became functus office is a matter relating to execution, satisfaction and discharge of the decree. It was held by this Court in Ramanna v. Nallaparaju, (S) AIR 1956 SC 87 at p. 91 that :"When a sale in execution of a decree is impugned on the ground that it is not warranted by the terms thereof, that question could be agitated, when it arises between parties to the decree, only by an application under S. 47, and not in a separate suit". See also J. Marret v. Mahomed Khaleel Shirazi and Sons, AIR 1930 PC 86 where the facts were that an order was made by the Executing Court directing contrary to the terms of the decree the payment of a certain found to the decree holder. The Madras High Court in Mahomed Sikri Sahib v. Madhava Kurup, AIR 1949 Mad 809 held that where the Executing Court was not aware of the amendment of the Rent Restriction Act by which the execution of decree was prohibited and passed an ejectment decree against a tenant, the Executing Court could not execute the decree and any possession given under an ex parte order passed in execution of such a decree, could be set aside under S. 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure. The prohibition is equally puissant in the present case and S. 47 read with S. 151 would be equally effective to sustain the order of redelivery made in favour of the respondent. 9. The applicability of res judicata and defences of waiver and estoppel were also raised by the appellants. The contention of res judicata was based on the plea taken by the respondent in his written statement, dated March 11, 1946, where he pleaded that the civil Court had no jurisdiction to order eviction because of the House Rent Control Order, 1945, to which the reply of the appellants was that considering the nature of the suit and the consequential remedy that they were seeking the plea of jurisdiction of the Court was not open to the respondent. Thereupon the trial Court raised a new issue "whether this court has jurisdiction to try the suit, in view of the House Rent Control Order" which was decided against the respondent and a decree in favour of the appellants was passed on August 23, 1945. This judgment formed the basis of the argument before us that the plea of inexecutability of the decree could not be raised because it was barred on the principle of res judicata. The plea of res judicata is not available to the appellants as the prohibition on account of the House Rent Control Order was not against the passing of the decree but against its execution and therefore the objection to the executability could only be taken at the time of the execution of the decree which in the instant case could not be done because the order for delivery by the Executing Court was passed without notice to the respondent. We must, therefore, repel the contention based on the ground of res judicata. 10. The argument of waiver and estoppel is also devoid of force. This plea was based on a letter which the respondents lawyer sent in replay to the respondent asking to make arrangements to put the appellants in possession. The former replied there to that his client was making arrangements and as soon as he could do so, he would hand over possession to the appellants. This is slender basis for the sustainability of the plea of waiver and estoppel. There is no conduct on the part of the respondent which has induced the appellants to charge their position or has in any way affected their rights and the plea of non-executability which has been taken is based on statute and against statute there cannot be an estoppel. This ground taken by the appellants is equally unsound and must be rejected. 11. The contention raised that ignoring Ss. 9(1) and 16 of the 1948 House Rent Control Order is no more than an error in the exercise of jurisdiction does not appear to be sound because those sections are a fetter on the executability of the decree and not merely an error in the exercise of the jurisdiction. In the present case the two sections mentioned above were a restriction on the power of the court to execute the decree and therefore this argument must also be rejected. 1

Decision (1 = appeal accepted, 0 = rejected): 0

Explanation:
0[ds]To test the force of this argument it is necessary to examine the provisions of Part B States (Laws) Act and how and when as a consequence of it the Transfer of Property Act became effective and operative in the State of Mysore. Section 3 of that Act deals with the extension and amendment of certain Acts and Ordinances. The Acts and the Ordinances specified in the Schedule were amended and became applicable as specified and as a consequence the fourth paragraph of S. 1 for the words "Bombay, Punjab or Delhi" the words "that the said States" were substituted. Therefore the effect of the Part B State (Laws) Act merely was that qua the Transfer of Property Act, the State of Mysore was placed on the same footing as the States of Bombay, Punjab or Delhi It was by virtue of a Notification No. 2676-Cts. 46-51-5 dated September 12, 1951, that the Transfer of Property Act was extended to the State of Mysore as from October 1, 1951. Consequently the laws of the State applying to leases which would include the Mysore House Rent Control Order of 1948 continued to be in force and applicable to cases that were pending till it was repealed by the Mysore Rent Control Act of 1951 which received the Presidents assent on August 16, 1951. The argument, therefore, that as from April 1, 1951, as a result of repugnancy the House Rent Control Order of 1948 stood repealed must be repelled as unsound and cannot be sustained, because it was an existing law which was saved by Art. 372 of the Constitution and remained unaffected by Art. 251. The contention raised that ignoring Ss. 9(1) and 16 of the 1948 House Rent Control Order is no more than an error in the exercise of jurisdiction does not appear to be sound because those sections are a fetter on the executability of the decree and not merely an error in the exercise of the jurisdiction. In the present case the two sections mentioned above were a restriction on the power of the court to execute the decree and therefore this argument must also be rejected.